The relationship between auditory performances and satisfaction of unilateral bone anchored hearing aid users

Objective: Hearing loss decreases the quality of life by creating a negative effect on the social, academic, psychological and similar areas of individuals. The use of conventional airway hearing devices in some types of conductive and mixed type hearing loss that cannot be solved by surgery or medical treatment can cause complications and cannot be able to used. Amplification with bone implanted hearing instruments, middle ear operations or bone path hearing instruments are recommended for this group of patients. The aim of this study; is to investigate the deviced and non-deviced auditory performance results of patients with unilateral bone anchored hearing aid. Material and Methods: The study has been carried out at the Ege University ENT Department. Data of the research has been collected between February 2018 and June 2018. Study was performed among patients aged 9-65 with at least 3 months of rugular use of unilateral bone anchored hearing aid. In order to evaluate hearing performances, deviced and non deviced free field hearing thresholds, speech discrimination and sentence discrimination scores were evaluated. In order to evaluate the satisfaction, a shortened profile of the benefit from the hearing instrument (Abbreviated Profile of Hearing Aid Benefit, APHAB) was used. Results: A total of 17 adults and children participated in the study. Of the participants, 10 (59%) were female and 7 (41%) were male. The mean age was 37.9± 17.1 years. Ten of the participants use the device in the right ear and 7 in the left ear. Among the voluntees who treated with bone anchored hearing aid included in the study, 6 of them had external ear canal atresia (35%), 2 of them had external ear canal stenosis (12%), and 9 of them had chronic otitis media (53%). There was a significant difference between deviced and non deviced free field threshold in all frequencies, separately average of 500, 1000, 2000, 4000 Hz (p<0.05). There was a statistically significant difference between the APHAB satisfaction questionnaire and total scores, Ease of Communication(EC), Background Noise(BN), Reverberation(RV) subscales according to device status (with device or non device) (p<0.05). However, there was no significant difference in Aversiveness of Sounds (AV) subscale (p>0.05). There was also a statistically significant difference between deviced and non deviced speech discrimination and sentence test scores (p<0.05). No significant difference was found between the APHAB total score result of the group divided by hearing aid threshold (p>0.05). No significant difference was found between the APHAB total score result of the group divided by the threshold without hearing aid (p>0.05). Conclusion: Bone implanted hearing aids are effective and reliable amplification methods in patients with conductive and mixed hearing loss who cannot use conventional air or bone conduction hearing devices. Positive results of patient satisfaction and evaluation inventories obtained from this study can be considered as a reference for other patients. Further studies with longer patient samples are needed on this topic.