Prabhu Prashanth, Barman Animesh
Department of Audiology, All India Institute of Speech and Hearing Ringgold Standard Institution, Mysore, Karnataka, India.
Int Arch Otorhinolaryngol. 2017 Jul;21(3):243-249. doi: 10.1055/s-0036-1593471. Epub 2016 Nov 22.
The studies on hearing aid benefit in individuals with auditory neuropathy spectrum disorder (ANSD) shows limited benefit. Low cut modified amplification is found to be effective in few individuals with ANSD. With advancement in technology, receiver in the canal (RIC) hearing aids have proven to be more effective than traditional behind the ear (BTE) hearing aids. Thus, the present study attempts to determine the effectiveness of low cut modified amplification using RIC and BTE. Twenty participants with ANSD were fitted with BTE and RIC using traditional and low cut modified amplification. We divided them into good and poor performers based on unaided speech identification scores (SIS). We then compared aided SIS and aided benefit across conditions in good and poor performers with ANSD across both conditions using BTE and RIC. The results of the study showed that the aided performance improved with low cut modified amplification in both BTE and RIC hearing aids. The improvement noticed with low-cut modified fitting with RIC was significant in more than BTE, especially in good performers with ANSD. The improved clarity and naturalness of sound with RIC may have led to better aided scores and better acceptance of the hearing aid. Thus, low-cut modified amplification, preferably with RIC, needs to be attempted in fitting individuals with ANSD, especially in those with good unaided SIS in quiet.
关于听觉神经病谱系障碍（ANSD）患者助听器获益的研究显示获益有限。低切峰修正放大在少数ANSD患者中被发现是有效的。随着技术的进步，耳道式受话器（RIC）助听器已被证明比传统的耳背式（BTE）助听器更有效。因此，本研究试图确定使用RIC和BTE进行低切峰修正放大的有效性。20名ANSD患者分别使用传统放大和低切峰修正放大适配了BTE和RIC助听器。我们根据未佩戴助听器时的言语识别得分（SIS）将他们分为表现好和表现差的两组。然后，我们比较了使用BTE和RIC助听器时，ANSD患者在两种情况下表现好和表现差的两组患者在不同条件下的佩戴后SIS和佩戴后获益情况。研究结果表明，BTE和RIC助听器采用低切峰修正放大后佩戴表现均有所改善。RIC低切峰修正适配的改善在程度上比BTE更显著，尤其是在安静环境中未佩戴助听器时SIS较好的ANSD患者中。RIC带来的声音清晰度和自然度的改善可能导致了更好的佩戴后得分和对助听器更好的接受度。因此，在为ANSD患者适配助听器时，尤其是为安静环境中未佩戴助听器时SIS较好的患者适配时，需要尝试低切峰修正放大，最好使用RIC。
