A person who is hard of hearing, a person who is deaf

People with complete hearing loss (for example, due to injury, health or age changes) retain the ability to speak. Even children born with a hearing impairment can learn to speak, but their pronunciation will be different from the pronunciation of those with hearing. Therefore, to say that such people are “deaf-mute” is incorrect.

Among the Deaf community, some consider the term “hearing-impared” acceptable, while others do not. It is better to use a term that is acceptable to most people – “person who is hard of hearing”.