Parameters of speech intelligibility in patients with chronic sensoneural hearing loss depending on the hearing aid type

Abstract

Nowadays audiologist has a large number of modern digital hearing aids (HA) to cover for different degrees of hearing loss. In some cases the same patient can be recommended several types and models of HA based on audiological data. Sometimes it creates difficulties in choice, especially for patients who have no experience of using the device. The objective of this study was to compare the results of the electroacoustic correction of various types of HA. The study covered 100 patients with similar audiological profile (2nd or 3rd degree of the chronic sensoneural hearing loss, sloping descendant or sloping audiogram). All the patients were divided into 4 equal groups depending on the type of device: behind­the­ear (BTE), BTE with slim tube (ВТЕ slim), receiver­in­the­canal (RIC) or complitely­in­the­canal (CIC). The HAs had identical acoustic characteristics. The speech intelligibility index (SII) was determined before using the hearing aid, after 12 weeks of hearing aid use without HA and with HA. Before HA using the average SII was 47.5%. 3 months after SII using without the HA was in average 49.7% with significant improvement in the RIC and CIC groups. SII with HA 3 months after HA using averaged 83.27% (81.73% in the BTE group, 80.94% in the BTEslim group, 85.47% in the RIC group and 84,94% in the CIC group). In this case SII with HA was significantly higher in the RIC and CIC groups. The obtained results prove higher speech intelligibility parameters in patients with the 2nd or 3rd degree of the chronic sensoneural hearing loss with RIC and CIC devices.