RESUMO
Background: Hearing impairment is a major problem worldwide, significantly delaying acquisition of speech in children. Unfortunately delayed detection of hearing impairment especially in rural and remote areas, adds a significant burden to the society and the nation. Hence early detection of hearing impairment is imperative and the need of the hour lies in developing an easy, cost effective and reliable method for testing large number of neonates and infants. This study was to assess the effectiveness and utility of Tympanometry as a screening tool for assessment of middle ear pathology in neonates and infants. Middle ear disorders are significantly prevalent in young children. Aim: Investigating and comparing the results of visual inspection of the tympanic membrane to the results of Tympanometry with traditional probe tone (226 Hz) and high frequency probe tone (678 Hz) in” ears without effusion” and “ears with effusion” and to establish their sensitivity and specificity to detect middle ear disorders as a database in clinical practice. Materials and methods: Subjects were evaluated for the stable middle ear/ Eustachian tube function. Ears with no sign of effusion in the middle ear on otoscopy were labeled as “ears without effusion” and those who showed the presence of fluid in the middle ear were labeled as “ears with effusion”. Blinded to otoscopic ear exam results, Tympanometry was conducted with conventional probe tone of 226 Hz and high probe tone 678 Hz by audiologist using standard procedure. Results: Otoscopic examination results of ears for all age groups were evaluated and ears without effusion and with effusion were tabulated. Y. Kishore Kumar, Ajay Kumar Basod, G. Obulesu. Clinical study on low vs high probe tone frequency tympanometry in children: Rural population. IAIM, 2016; 3(10): 251-258. Page 252 Conclusion: The tympanometric parameters obtained with 226 Hz and 678 Hz probe tones have statistically significant differences in detecting the ears without effusion and with effusion. Compliance values also proved to be statistically different with the different probe tones.
RESUMO
Introduction: Hearing impairment is one of the most common handicapping problems in this country. There are millions of individuals in this country with varying degrees and types of hearing impairment including children, adults and elders. Hearing is important for speech and language development. Even minor degrees of hearing impairment, especially pre-lingual can affect overall development. Aim: To correlate the different audiogram configurations in adults with acquired sensori-neural hearing loss with the self reported auditory difficulties (which rules out biased reports). Materials and methods: The research design was exploratory and the sampling was purposive. The sampling selection was prospective. All the subjects we selected were according to the following criteria. Inclusion criteria were the patients selected should have minimum 3 years of sensori-neural hearing loss, age range was between 18 to 60 years, pure-tone average (500, 1000 and 2000 Hz) hearing loss was > 25 dB HL and ˂70 dB. Results: Audiogram Pattern wereFlat Pattern, Gradual Sloping, Sharply sloping, Precipitously sloping. Conclusion: Irrespective of audiogram configurations speech intelligibility in noise is most severely affected and discrimination of sound is least severely affected. The patients with similar looking audiograms had similar perception of auditory difficulties (Flat and gradual sloping patterns had similar difficulties. Trough/ saucer and notch also had similar auditory difficulties).