this post was submitted on 05 Jan 2024
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Irrelevant to my argument. All I mean is because they go to visit someone for one problem can mean they visit other people for other problems they have - rather than ignoring things and staying at home. And I am not claiming what I said to be the actual cause - at least no more than what the study can claim. There could be many other factors at play here as well. My only point is to not confuse causation for correlation and that these types of studies are almost useless in what they tell us.
Hell, even spurious correlations happen all the time. You cannot use two graphs looking similar to prove any point without a lot of control for all the other variables that might be at play and not go looking at large amounts of data for anything that might seem interesting.
I like where your heads at, here's the study with a solid summary up front: https://www.thelancet.com/action/showPdf?pii=S2666-7568%2823%2900232-5
It has a great sample (nearly 10,000 folks with a mean age of 48.6 and having a standard deviation of 18.1) and the findings fortified previous studies. Biggest thing is the fact 12.7% of those with hearing aids rock em, and rocking em is the defining feature in the study. Even when non-consistent users were grouped together with those never having used a hearing aid, the consistent group lived longer. This alone shows going to the doc isn't as impactful as you might to think.
Edit: The work also states more research is required, but the data is looking like something big would have to arise to disprove the construct!