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Outcomes With a Self-Fitting Hearing Aid

Self-fitting hearing aids (SFHAs)—devices that enable self-directed threshold measurements leading to a prescribed hearing aid (HA) setting, and fine-tuning, without the need for professional support—are now commercially available. This study examined outcomes obtained with one commercial SFHA, the...

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Detalles Bibliográficos
Autores principales: Keidser, Gitte, Convery, Elizabeth
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: SAGE Publications 2018
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5991196/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/29716438
http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/2331216518768958
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author Keidser, Gitte
Convery, Elizabeth
author_facet Keidser, Gitte
Convery, Elizabeth
author_sort Keidser, Gitte
collection PubMed
description Self-fitting hearing aids (SFHAs)—devices that enable self-directed threshold measurements leading to a prescribed hearing aid (HA) setting, and fine-tuning, without the need for professional support—are now commercially available. This study examined outcomes obtained with one commercial SFHA, the Companion (SoundWorld Solutions), when support was available from a clinical assistant during self-fitting. Participants consisted of 27 experienced and 25 new HA users who completed the self-fitting process, resulting in 38 user-driven and 14 clinician-driven fittings. Following 12 weeks’ experience with the SFHAs in the field, outcomes measured included the following: coupler gain and output, HA handling and management skills, speech recognition in noise, and self-reported benefit and satisfaction. In addition, the conventionally fitted HAs of 22 of the experienced participants who had user-driven fittings were evaluated. Irrespective of HA experience, the type of fitting (user- or clinician-driven) had no significant effect on coupler gain, speech recognition scores, or self-reported benefit and satisfaction. Users selected significantly higher low-frequency gain in the SFHAs when compared with the conventionally fitted HAs. The conventionally fitted HAs were rated significantly higher for benefit and satisfaction on some subscales due to negative issues with the physical design and implementation of the SFHAs, rather than who drove the fitting process. Poorer cognitive function was associated with poorer handling and management of the SFHAs. Findings suggest that with the right design and support, SFHAs may be a viable option to improve the accessibility of hearing health care.
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spelling pubmed-59911962018-06-13 Outcomes With a Self-Fitting Hearing Aid Keidser, Gitte Convery, Elizabeth Trends Hear Original Article Self-fitting hearing aids (SFHAs)—devices that enable self-directed threshold measurements leading to a prescribed hearing aid (HA) setting, and fine-tuning, without the need for professional support—are now commercially available. This study examined outcomes obtained with one commercial SFHA, the Companion (SoundWorld Solutions), when support was available from a clinical assistant during self-fitting. Participants consisted of 27 experienced and 25 new HA users who completed the self-fitting process, resulting in 38 user-driven and 14 clinician-driven fittings. Following 12 weeks’ experience with the SFHAs in the field, outcomes measured included the following: coupler gain and output, HA handling and management skills, speech recognition in noise, and self-reported benefit and satisfaction. In addition, the conventionally fitted HAs of 22 of the experienced participants who had user-driven fittings were evaluated. Irrespective of HA experience, the type of fitting (user- or clinician-driven) had no significant effect on coupler gain, speech recognition scores, or self-reported benefit and satisfaction. Users selected significantly higher low-frequency gain in the SFHAs when compared with the conventionally fitted HAs. The conventionally fitted HAs were rated significantly higher for benefit and satisfaction on some subscales due to negative issues with the physical design and implementation of the SFHAs, rather than who drove the fitting process. Poorer cognitive function was associated with poorer handling and management of the SFHAs. Findings suggest that with the right design and support, SFHAs may be a viable option to improve the accessibility of hearing health care. SAGE Publications 2018-05-01 /pmc/articles/PMC5991196/ /pubmed/29716438 http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/2331216518768958 Text en © The Author(s) 2018 http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ Creative Commons Non Commercial CC BY-NC: This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 License (http://www.creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/) which permits non-commercial use, reproduction and distribution of the work without further permission provided the original work is attributed as specified on the SAGE and Open Access pages (https://us.sagepub.com/en-us/nam/open-access-at-sage).
spellingShingle Original Article
Keidser, Gitte
Convery, Elizabeth
Outcomes With a Self-Fitting Hearing Aid
title Outcomes With a Self-Fitting Hearing Aid
title_full Outcomes With a Self-Fitting Hearing Aid
title_fullStr Outcomes With a Self-Fitting Hearing Aid
title_full_unstemmed Outcomes With a Self-Fitting Hearing Aid
title_short Outcomes With a Self-Fitting Hearing Aid
title_sort outcomes with a self-fitting hearing aid
topic Original Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5991196/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/29716438
http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/2331216518768958
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