Electro-acupuncture was applied for 149 perceptive deaf children. The control group included 43 deaf children treated by speical education method. Results showed that: in the group of electro-acupuncture, 53.3% had got improvement, higher than the group of special education by 23.3%. The improvement rate was higher in mild deaf group, than in severe group. It was also higher in acquired deaf subjects than in congenital subjects. In the deaf caused by “can dom hoa cuong” (aggressive fire of liver and bile), improvement level was higher than the deaf caused by “than am hu” (failure of kidney yinn). The treatment with more courses had got higher improvement than with less courses.
Rehabilitation of Hearing Impaired ; Child ; Deafness ; Electroacupuncture

Transient mutism resolving to cerebellar speech after posterior fossa surgery is a well recognized phenomenon, particularly in pediatric patients. The anatomic basis for this postoperative functional change is unclear, but may reside in the dominant superior cerebellar hemisphere or the medial deep cerebellar nuclei. We report a case of a 9-year-old boy who presented for surgical resection of a medulloblastoma. Preoperatively, his complaint consisted of headache, nausea, vomiting and cerebellar ataxia. He had normal speech. At one day after operation, suddenly he was unable to speech, however, communication through a variety of verbal cues, including sign language was possible. His mutism lasted 12 days and cerebellar dysarthria was slowly resolved.
Cerebellar Ataxia ; Cerebellar Nuclei ; Child* ; Cues ; Dysarthria ; Headache ; Humans ; Male ; Medulloblastoma* ; Mutism* ; Nausea ; Sign Language ; Vomiting

OBJECTIVE: Because of communication difficulties, the hearing-impaired face many disadvantages throughout their lives. One of those is limited access to health care services, particularly medication service. Though they suffer from problems related to taking medication properly, there have been few studies on their actual condition of medication use in Korea. This study is to investigate any obstacles to properly taking medications and, therefore, to suggest preliminary evidence for policy measures to improve safe medication use among the hearing-impaired. METHODS: Study participants consisted of hearing-impaired individuals living in Seoul. We also interviewed two sign language interpreters in order to illuminate health care state of the hearing-impaired. In-depth interview for each study participant was recorded and was translated into a written script for analysis. RESULTS: Study participants were comprised of four women (66.6%) and two men (33.3%). There were one participants in 20's, two participants in 30's, one 40's, and two 50's. Sign language interpreters were all women. One was in her 30's and the other was in her 40's. Communication difficulties have been found to be key barrier to use medication safely. A negative image of pharmacists also hinders safe medication usage, lowering access to local pharmacy and leading discretional self-medication. This article provides pharmacists with solutions to promote adherence in this population. CONCLUSION: The hearing-impaired had limited access to medication-related information as well as using services in a hospital and local pharmacy due to their disability. Institutional improvement for safe medication usage among the hearing-impaired is necessary.
Delivery of Health Care ; Female ; Health Services Accessibility ; Hearing ; Humans ; Korea ; Male ; Pharmacists ; Pharmacy ; Seoul ; Sign Language

PURPOSE: The purpose of this study was to evaluate the effects on health information education for the deaf. METHOD: One group pre-test and post-test research design was applied to 46 deaf people. The instrument developed by research team was used for data collection. The questionnaire consisted of 91 items including demographics and 5 diseases, such as hypertension, cancer, diabetes, pulmonary tuberculosis, and hepatitis. RESULT: The degrees of knowledge on 4 diseases, such as, hypertension, diabetes, pulmonary tuberculosis, and hepatitis were significantly improved. There was no educational effect on cancer even though the degree of knowledge during the pre-test was the highest. There were educational effects on 5 diseases by gender, but no effects by age and hearing/deaf status of parent. CONCLUSION: This study was the first for the deaf in nursing. Further studies are needed for the deaf who have low education. Also, good educational materials using video and CD need to be developed.
Data Collection ; Deafness ; Demography ; Education* ; Hepatitis ; Humans ; Hypertension ; Methods ; Nursing ; Parents ; Research Design ; Sign Language ; Tuberculosis, Pulmonary

Implantable devices for aural rehabilitation are widely developed worldwide. In the manuscript, we review the implantable middle ear hearing devices currently in use, such as the Vibrant Soundbridge system (Med-El Corporation), the MAXUM system (Ototronix LLC), the fourth-generation of Carina prosthesis (Otologics LLC), and the Esteem device. Implantable hearing aids will unquestionably be the major drivers of advancement in otologic practice in early future, improving the quality of life of an increasingly aged population, which will consequently require increased levels of hearing support.
Correction of Hearing Impairment ; Ear, Middle* ; Hearing ; Hearing Aids ; Ossicular Prosthesis* ; Prostheses and Implants ; Quality of Life

As people age, structural as well as neural degeneration occurs throughout the auditory system. Many older adults experience difficulty in understanding speech especially in adverse listening conditions although they can hear speech sounds. According to a report of the Committee on Hearing and Bioacoustics and Biomechanics of the National Research Council, peripheral, central-auditory, and cognitive systems have long been considered major factors affecting the understanding of speech. The present study aims to review 1) age-related changes in the peripheral, central-auditory, and cognitive systems, 2) the resulting decline in the understanding of speech, and 3) the clinical implication for audiologic rehabilitation of older adults. Once the factors affecting the understanding of speech in older adults are identified and the characteristics of age-related speech understanding difficulties are examined, clinical management could be developed for prevention and treatment. Future research about problems related to the understanding of speech in older adults will help to improve the quality of life in the elderly.
Adult ; Aged ; Aging* ; Cognition ; Correction of Hearing Impairment ; Hearing ; Humans ; National Academy of Sciences (U.S.) ; Phonetics ; Quality of Life

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVES: This study was designed to identify whether canal type hearing aids can be used by the patients who have undergone epitympanoplasty with mastoid obliteration for postoperative rehabilitation of hearing impaired and also to investigate the advantages of the complete in the canal (CIC) hearing aid for the postoperative rehabilitation of hearing impaired. SUBJECTS AND METHOD: Fourty-three ears belonging to 40 adults, who were treated by epitympanoplasty with mastoid obliteration for cholesteatoma from April 1995 to May 1999 were involved in this study. The impressions were taken and measured postoperatively by Vernier calipers anteroposteriorly (AP) and superoinferiorly (SI). It is well known that the size of the external auditory canal (EAC) should be over 7 mm in diameter and over 2 cm in length to be able to wear the CIC type hearing aid. The shape of the EAC was also taken into consideration. RESULTS: Thirty-five out of 43 ears were large enough to wear CIC hearing aids and all 43 for the canal (ITC) hearing aids. No ears were excluded from being able to wear a CIC or ITC hearing aid with respect to the shape of the EAC. CONCLUSION: Canal type hearing aides can be used after epitympanoplasty with mastoid obliteration which is used as a treatment of cholesteatoma.
Adult ; Cholesteatoma ; Correction of Hearing Impairment* ; Ear ; Ear Canal ; Hearing Aids ; Humans ; Mastoid* ; Rehabilitation*

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVES: Speech discrimination testing has been used to evaluate the communication disability, select hearing aid candidacy and appropriate amplification, plan and evaluate aural rehabilitation programs and assist in the determination of the site of lesion. Since the words of speech discrimination tests were made on the basis of the linguistic aspects and used till now, they underestimate the disability of high frequency hearing loss (HFHL). To ameliorate this problem, we analysed the words which were difficult to discriminate in FHL in a commonly used speech testing material using the acoustic analysis method. Also, the words were assorted to establish a basic data for a new speech material which could estimate the disability of HFHL. METHODS: 20 HFHL subjects (age 20-70), selected on the basis of pure tone audiometry, were found to be the descending type. They were tested to repeat the monosyllabic words at 10-15dB HL above the puretone threshold of 1000Hz and checked with the error responses. These words were sorted out according to the error response or the confusion rate and analyzed by consonants and vowels. The words were recorded with an audiologist's voice using a GSI 10 audiometer connected to the personal computer. This was analyzed by the acoustic analysis program that has the MATLAB function. With this program, a word was analyzed by an initial consonant, a vowel, and a final consonant for the intensity, the formant peak frequency and the time course. RESULTS: The words which were difficult to discriminate for HFHL were sorted out by the confusion rates. The words of articulation score 15-50% were revealed to have low intensity with short duration, and the peak frequency spectrum above 3 kHz. Also the consonant-vowel transition frequency was located above 3 kHz. CONCLUSION: These results could be used as a basic clinical data to make a new speech discrimination material which evaluates the disability of HFHL more accurately.
Acoustics* ; Audiometry ; Communication Disorders ; Correction of Hearing Impairment ; Hearing Aids ; Hearing Loss* ; Hearing* ; Linguistics ; Microcomputers ; Speech Discrimination Tests ; Speech Perception ; Voice

Aural rehabilitation is defined as a comprehensive service which includes hearing aid fitting, hearing aid orientation, auditory training, and informational/educational counseling for people with hearing loss in order to reduce deficits of auditory function, difficulty in communication, and limited social activity, and ultimately to enhance their quality of life. Although it is well known that auditory training among a large scope of the aural rehabilitation is critical to improve residual hearing of hearing-impaired adults and/or older adults, there are some limitations to conduct it in the clinic in terms of time consuming and individual difference. In this review paper, we introduce two of the most popular web-based auditory training programs, namely Listening and Communication Enhancement And customized learning: Exercises for Aural Rehabilitation. The paper analyzes their purpose, contents, effect (or benefit) of auditory training, and clinical application, while arguing their pros and cons. In conclusion, we discuss a necessary of developing auditory training platforms for the hearing-impaired adults and older adults, and then of forging systematic web-based auditory training tools with a low-cost and high efficiency because aging population is rapidly increasing in Korea.
Adult ; Aging ; Correction of Hearing Impairment* ; Counseling ; Education* ; Exercise* ; Hearing ; Hearing Aids ; Hearing Loss ; Humans ; Individuality ; Korea ; Learning* ; Quality of Life

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVES: The stimulus signals delivered in cochlear implant (CI) systems are generally derived by sampling the temporal envelope of each channel at some constant rate and using its intensity to control the stimulation current level delivered to the corresponding electrode site. The objective of the study was to investigate speech recognition performance of cochlear implant users in quiet and noisy environments using either moderate or high rates of electrical stimulations. MATERIALS AND METHODS: Six post-lingually deafened adult users of the Nucleus CI24 cochlear implant (Contour(R) electrode array, Cochlear(TM), Macquarie Park, Australia) with the Freedom(R) speech processor participated in the study. Stimulation rates of 900 and 2400 pulses-per-second/channel (pps/ch) were used after both stimulation programs were balanced for loudness. Monosyllabic word and sentence recognition scores in quiet and noisy environments were evaluated for each stimulation program after two months of practice. Subjects were also asked to respond to a questionnaire to examine their preference to any stimulation rate in different hearing conditions. RESULTS: Word recognition scores for monosyllabic words in quiet conditions with the 900 stimulation rate was better than that of the 2400 stimulation rate, although no significant differences between them were found for sentence test in noise. A survey questionnaire indicated that most subjects preferred the 900 stimulation rate to the 2400 stimulation rate, especially in quiet conditions. CONCLUSIONS: Most subjects indicated a preference for 900 pps/ch rate in quiet conditions. It is recommended to remap at 900 pps/ch for those CI users whose performance in quiet conditions is less than ideal.
Adult ; Cochlear Implants ; Correction of Hearing Impairment ; Electric Stimulation ; Electrodes ; Hearing ; Humans ; Noise ; Speech Perception ; Sydnones ; Surveys and Questionnaires