Hearing ; physiology ; Hearing Tests ; Humans

OBJECTIVE: To determine the agreement between Otoacoustic Emission and "Baah" tests for detecting binaural hearing loss in infants referred for hearing evaluation in a local community setting.
METHOD: This is a retrospective review done in a Private Community-based Secondary Specialty Hospital. Bilateral hearing test results of 788 neonates and infants obtained between September 2011 and January 2013 using human voice "BAAH" test and OAE were reviewed from January 2014 to September 2015.
RESULTS: There were 432 males and 356 females (male: female ratio 1.2:1) with a mean age of 11.17 days (range of 0-143 days). Of the 780 infants with bilateral "Pass" using OAE, all were screened as "with response" by "Baah" tests. Five infants with bilateral "refer" results using OAE yielded "no response" on "Baah" test. Sensitivity of 'Baah' test was 100%, specificity was 99.5%, with positive predictive value of 62.5%, and negative predictive value of 100%. There was good agreement noted between OAE and "Baah" (kappa=.77, p<.001).
CONCLUSION: The "Baah" test is a possible alternative to OAE in initially detecting binaural hearing loss in areas where equipment and personnel are limited. Although "Baah" test could only detect 62% of infants with binaural hearing loss and could not detect unilateral hearing loss, infants detected with binaural hearing loss can be immediately referred to centers with more sophisticated equipment.

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVES: The Gaps-In-Noise (GIN) test is a measure to assess auditory temporal resolution, which is the ability to follow rapid changes in the envelope of a sound stimulus over time. We investigated whether unilateral tinnitus affects temporal resolution by the GIN performance. SUBJECTS AND METHODS: Hearing tests including the GIN test were performed in 120 ears of 60 patients with unilateral tinnitus who showed symmetric hearing within 20 dB HL difference up to 8 kHz (tinnitus-affected ears, 14.6+/-11.2 dB HL; non-tinnitus ears 15.1+/-11.5 dB HL) and 60 ears of 30 subjects with normal hearing. Comparisons were made between tinnitus and non-tinnitus side of patients and normal ears of controls. RESULTS: There was no significant difference of the mean GIN thresholds among tinnitus-affected ears (5.18+/-0.6 ms), non-tinnitus ears (4.98+/-0.6 ms) and normal ears (4.97+/-0.8 ms). The mean percentage of correct answers in tinnitus side (67.3+/-5.5%) was slightly less than that in non-tinnitus side (70.0+/-5.5%) but it was not significantly different from that in normal ears (69.4+/-7.5%). Neither the GIN threshold nor the GIN perception level in tinnitus ears has relation to sex, frequency and loudness of tinnitus, and audiometric data. Age only showed a significant correlation with the GIN performance. CONCLUSIONS: We found no evidence which supported the influence of unilateral tinnitus on auditory temporal resolution. These results imply that tinnitus may not simply fill in the silent gaps in the background noise.
Ear ; Hearing ; Hearing Tests ; Humans ; Noise ; Tinnitus*

Child ; Hearing ; Hearing Tests ; Humans ; Infant

Hearing ; Hearing Tests ; Humans ; Mass Screening

Hearing ; Hearing Loss, Noise-Induced ; Hearing Tests ; Humans ; Noise ; Recreation

Hearing ; Hearing Aids ; Hearing Tests ; Humans ; World Health Organization

Objective: The goal of this work is the creation of word lists, in Ilocano, suitable for use in speech audiometry. Methods: First, estimates of the distribution of speech sounds and of the most common syllable structures in Ilocano were found from a phonetic transcription analysis of nearly 3000 words obtained from three magazine articles. Second, 372 two-syllable words were rated, for commonness, by fifteen native speakers of Ilocano who currently reside in Hawaii. Finally, various combinations of two-syllable words were made to produce 50-item lists. Results: First, an estimate of the distribution of speech sounds in Ilocano was found, with frequencies of occurrence ranging from 22.4 percent, for the speech sound /a/, to 0.007 percent, for the speech sound M. The syllable-structure analyses revealed that a very small number of distinct monosyllabic words were used very frequently. Two-syllable words were also used frequently, but were attributed to many distinct words. Second, from the rating results, approximately 70 percent of the two-syllable words in the rating survey were judged as common by 12 or more of the raters. Finally, four lists of 50 words each were constructed using only common two-syllable words with the most frequent two-syllable structures found in Ilocano. Each word list has a distribution of speech sounds that approximates that found from the phonetic analysis, and hence each list is roughly phonetically-balanced. Conclusions: These word lists may be of value to otolaryngologists and audiologists who work with native speakers of Ilocano. (Author)
AUDIOMETRY AUDIOMETRY ; SPEECH HEARING TESTS

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVES: The evaluation of vestibular function is very important for patients with sudden sensorineural hearing loss (SNHL) as it is a well-known prognostic factor. The purpose of this study was to evaluate subclinical vestibular dysfunction (SVD) and its association with prognosis in sudden SNHL patients with and without dizziness using the vestibular function tests. SUBJECTS AND METHOD: Seventy eight patients who had been diagnosed with unilateral sudden SNHL were examined by dividing them into three groups according to their clinical findings such as vestibular function and subjective symptoms: 1) normal, 2) SVD and 3) dizziness. Vestibular dysfunction and hearing recovery rates were also assessed. RESULTS: Patients with SVD accounted for 62.5% of patients even though they did not complain subjective dizziness. The extent of vestibular dysfunction in the dizziness group was greater than that in the SVD group (p=0.05). The hearing recovery rates for normal, SVD and dizziness group were 72% (13/18), 57% (17/30) and 48% (12/25), respectively. The incidence and extent of vestibular dysfunction was greater in patients with severe hearing loss than in those with moderate to severe loss. A significant correlation was noted between hearing recovery rate and vestibular evoked myogenic potential (VEMP) testing. Normal and abnormal VEMP data were associated with good and poor recovery (p=0.001). CONCLUSION: The evaluation of vestibular function is important in sudden SNHL patients with dizziness; however, SVD also explains a significant proportion of sudden SNHL in the absence of dizziness. Notably, VEMP is useful tools for evaluating prognosis of sudden SNHL.
Dizziness ; Hearing ; Hearing Loss ; Hearing Loss, Sensorineural* ; Hearing Loss, Sudden ; Humans ; Incidence ; Prognosis ; Vestibular Function Tests*

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVES: Auditory temporal resolution, which refers to the time-related aspects of acoustic processing, can be evaluated by the Gaps-In-Noise (GIN) test. We investigated whether the presence of high frequency sensorineural hearing loss (HF-SNHL) affects the temporal resolution of GIN performance in older adults with normal hearing. SUBJECTS AND METHOD: Hearing tests including the GIN test were performed in 87 subjects with normal pure tone average. The GIN threshold and percentage of correct answers were compared among 4 groups of participants; older adults with normal hearing (n=18), older adults with HF-SNHL (n=24), young adults with normal hearing (n=24) and young adults with HF-SNHL (n=21). RESULTS: There was no significant difference in the mean GIN thresholds between the HF-SNHL group (5.8+/-0.8 msec) and the normal hearing group (6.0+/-0.8 msec) in older adults, whereas the mean GIN thresholds of HF-SNHL group was higher than that of the normal group in young adults (4.6+/-0.3 msec vs. 4.2+/-0.5 msec, p<0.05). The mean percentage of correct answers of HF-SNHL group (62.5+/-5.5%) was not significantly different from that of the normal hearing group (60.6+/-3.9%) in the old, unlike in the young (71.3+/-4.0% with HF-SNHL vs. 76.9+/-4.3% with normal hearing, p<0.05). Age only showed a significant correlation with the GIN performance. Neither the GIN threshold nor the GIN perception level had any relation with the presence of HF-SNHL in older adults. CONCLUSION: We found no evidence that supported the influence of HF-SNHL on auditory temporal resolution in older adults. These results imply that HF-SNHL may be of little importance in gap detection after age-related changes in central auditory system.
Acoustics ; Adult ; Hearing Loss, High-Frequency ; Hearing Loss, Sensorineural* ; Hearing Tests ; Hearing* ; Humans ; Young Adult*