It is my great pleasure to announce that the “Public Health Planning for Hearing Impairment (PHPHI)” will be held on November 14-17, 2023 in Seoul, Korea. I would like to invite everyone in the field to join us on this unique course.

The Korean government is implementing various policies related to hearing loss as well as hearing-impaired people. It provides a lot of support, expanding national health insurance benefits for newborn hearing screening tests and cochlear implants, and supporting the payment for a hearing aid for disabled people registered for hearing loss. However, these works are operated separately and not systematically integrated into the life cycle continuity coherently. Therefore, I believe that a systematic organization under the Ministry of Health and Welfare and a legal support for it are necessary for the “life-long care for ear and hearing health (EHH)” of the Korean people.

For this goal, it is essential to create a national as well as global network of EHH professionals trained in public hearing health to address the challenge of hearing loss. It is also important to expand capacity building for public health knowledge and skills in EHH amongst health professionals and health planners. In this course, I will invite Professor Andrew Smith (London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, London, UK) to organize with the Korean team. Professor Andrew Smith has a lot of experience in hearing policy at WHO and previous experiences with PHPHI around the world. The courses will attract academics and professionals in otology and audiology and allied fields, policy-makers, healthcare planning governors, and NGOs, and will be supported by the Korean Otological Society and the Korean Audiological Society.

I sincerely extend my invitation to all of you to attend the PHPHI short course 2023 Seoul and look forward to welcoming you, hoping that all together we will make the successful PHPHI short course 2023 Seoul.

Sincerely,

It gives me great pleasure to welcome you to this Training Workshop about Public Health Planning for Hearing Impairment in Seoul. I am very pleased to be a part of the first collaboration between the Seoul National University and the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine in the field of Ear and Hearing Health. I hope every participant finds the Training Workshop useful for learning about the Public Health Approach to Ear and Hearing Health and beneficial for project planning in Ear and Hearing Care.

I look forward to meeting everyone in person in Seoul in November.

With best wishes,