Abstract
Aging causes changes in the external ear as a collapse of the external auditory canal and tympanic membrane senile. Knowing them is appropriate for the diagnosis of hearing loss and selection of hearing aids. For this reason, the study aimed to verify the influence of the anatomical changes of the external ear resonance in the auditory canal in the elderly. The sample consisted of objective measures of the external ear of elderly with collapse (group A), senile tympanic membrane (group B) and without changing the external auditory canal or tympanic membrane (group C) and adults without changing the external ear (group D). In the retrospective/clinical study were performed comparisons of measures of individuals with and without alteration of the external ear through the gain and response external ear resonant frequency and the primary peak to the right ear. In groups A, B and C was no statistically significant difference between Real Ear Unaided Response (REUR) and Real Ear Unaided Gain (REUG), but not for the peak frequency. For groups A and B were shown significant differences in REUR and REUG. Between the C and D groups were significant statistics to the REUR and REUG, but not for the frequency of the primary peak. Changes influence the external ear resonance, decreasing its amplitude. However, the frequency of the primary peak is not affected.
Highlights
The external ear consists of the pinna and the external auditory canal (EAC)
The EAC is slightly sinuous, being about 2.5–3.0 cm long in adults, from its opening up to the tympanic membrane[2]. It is a tube with an open end and a closed end, which behaves as a resonator from a quarter-wave, with the resonance frequency being represented by the equation F=v/4L, where “v” is the speed of sound and “L” the length of the EAC
Once the significance of the analysis of variance (ANOVA) was confirmed between groups A, B, and C regarding the average of the Real Ear Unaided Response (REUR) and Real Ear Unaided Gain (REUG) measures for the right ear, Tukey’s test was used for comparison of means, to ascertain whether there was minimal significant difference
Summary
The external ear consists of the pinna and the external auditory canal (EAC). The pinna is a fibrocartilaginous structure with hillocks and recesses, among them are the helix, anti-helix, tragus, anti-tragus, concha, and the external auditory meatus. The EAC is slightly sinuous, being about 2.5–3.0 cm long in adults, from its opening up to the tympanic membrane[2]. It is a tube with an open end (concha portion) and a closed end (tympanic membrane), which behaves as a resonator from a quarter-wave, with the resonance frequency being represented by the equation F=v/4L, where “v” is the speed of sound and “L” the length of the EAC. The resonance of the canal occurs at a frequency range of 2,700 Hz, with amplitude between 10 and 20 dB , [3,4] and these frequencies are essential for speech recognition[4,5]
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