Clinical Trial for Cartilage Conduction Hearing Aid in Indonesia.

Ronny Suwento,Tri Juda Airlangga,Dini Widiarni Widodo,Keisuke Watanuki,Widayat Alviandi,Hiroshi Hosoi,Naoko Nakanowatari,Tadashi Nishimura

doi:10.3390/audiolres11030038

Abstract

Hearing improvement represents one of the may valuable outcomes in microtia and aural atresia reconstruction surgery. Most patients with poor development in their hearing function have had a severe microtia. Conventional methods to improve hearing function are bone conduction and bone anchored hearing aids. Cartilage conduction hearing aids (CCHA) represents a new amplification method. This study assessed the outcomes and evaluated the impact and its safety in the patients with microtia and aural atresia whose hearing dysfunction did not improve after surgery for ear reconstruction in our hospital. Hearing functions were evaluated with pure tone audiometry or sound field testing by behavioral audiometry and speech audiometry before and after CCHA fitting. As a result, there was a significant difference between unaided and aided thresholds (p < 0.001). Speech recognition threshold and speech discrimination level also significantly improved with CCHA. The average functional gains of 14 ears were 26.9 ± 2.3 dB. Almost all parents of the patients reported satisfaction with the performance of CCHA, and daily communication in children with hearing loss also became better than usual.

Highlights

Microtia is a congenital auricular malformation that usually occurs in conjunction with ear canal atresia, and ranges from mild structural abnormalities to the complete absence of the ear
The present study evaluated 10 children diagnosed as microtia and aural atresia
It should be explained that the results of behavioral audiometry in patient one are inconsistent during the three months of the examination sessions

Summary

Introduction

Publisher’s Note: MDPI stays neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations. Microtia is a congenital auricular malformation that usually occurs in conjunction with ear canal atresia, and ranges from mild structural abnormalities to the complete absence of the ear (anotia). The prevalence rate of microtia ranges from 0.83 to 17.4 per 10,000 [1]

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