Ghana HARK! 2009-2010
Ghana’s need for an audiology service was brought to the attention of Sound Seekers in 1988 during an international conference on Deaf Education, Prevention and Hearing Impairment. With the support of Sound Seekers, the Kumasi Hearing Assessment Centre was established as the first of its kind in West Africa, and is presently the only World Health Organisation collaborating centre for the prevention and management of deafness south of the Sahara. The Centre currently provides a range of audiological and educational services including screening, diagnosis, referral and treatment of hearing loss and offers training in audiology for medical students and officers, and nurses. The provision of an outreach service via a fully equipped HARK audiology and ear disease treatment, mobile clinic will help further develop the good, but limited, infrastructure, enabling it to reach out to geographically isolated communities. The HARK! mobile clinic and audiologists will undertake a programme of visits to rural clinics in and across the northern and central regions. The vehicle and staff will be based at the Kumasi Centre, which is attached to and draws on the resources of the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology.