Pretoria University celebrates second international honour today

01 July 2016 - 13:46 By TMG Digital

A professor at the University of Pretoria has won an international award for pioneering an app that lets users test their hearing using their smartphone - the second global acknowledgement of the university's staff to be announced on Friday. Professor De Wet Swanepoel‚ professor of Audiology at the Department of Speech-Language Pathology and Audiology at the UP‚ was awarded the S2A3 British Association Medal for his contributions to the use of technology and connectivity to fight hearing impairment.And Professor Ann Skelton‚ director of the Centre for Child Law in the University of Pretoria's Faculty of Law‚ has been elected as a member of the United Nations Committee on the Rights of the Child.The centre congratulated her via Twitter.Skelton was nominated by the SA government. She helped write post-apartheid South Africa's laws to help children in trouble with the law and has fought for over two decades to protect the rights of children in most circumstances - ranging from a divorce case‚ to a child mistreated at a children’s home.Commenting on the British award for Prof Swanepoel‚ UP said in on its website that the British Association Medal dates back to 1932 and is one of the highest awards for original scientific research in southern Africa.Prof Swanepoel's contributions to this field include the development and validation of smartphone-based hearing testing at a fraction of the cost of conventional testing. UP said the hearZA app that he and his team developed is very user-friendly and can be operated by laypersons towards early detection of hearing loss in both children and adults.Permanent debilitating hearing loss affects more than 360 million people across the globe‚ of which approximately three million were South African.Swanepoel‚ in a lecture after the award‚ described hearing loss as a silent and invisible epidemic that had various serious consequences for society at large‚ including higher unemployment and mortality rates‚ poor health‚ social isolation‚ depression and dementia.According to Prof Swanepoel‚ more than 80% of people affected by debilitating hearing loss reside in developing countries. Despite most cases of hearing loss being preventable or treatable‚ the overwhelming majority of people in these countries do not have access to care. New solutions arising from advances in technology and connectivity‚ however‚ show great promise in increasing access to care."Decentralising ear and hearing health care will impact positively on the devastating burden the current health care systems are experiencing. It will ensure that the benefits of early hearing loss detection are realised while the negative impact is minimised and even negated‚" he said...

There’s never been a more important time to support independent media.

From World War 1 to present-day cosmopolitan South Africa and beyond, the Sunday Times has been a pillar in covering the stories that matter to you.

For just R80 you can become a premium member (digital access) and support a publication that has played an important political and social role in South Africa for over a century of Sundays. You can cancel anytime.

Already subscribed? Sign in below.



Questions or problems? Email helpdesk@timeslive.co.za or call 0860 52 52 00.