Establishment of a Template for the Assessment of Hearing Aids Outcomes / 听力学及言语疾病杂志

ABSTRACT

Objective The objective of the present study was to establish a template for the self assessment of hearing aids outcomes according to the evaluation of a large group of hearing aid users .Methods In total ,1 724 subjects participated in the study .The Chinese version of International Outcome Inventory for Hearing Aids (IOI-HA) was used as the evaluation tool .IOI -HA is a seven -item questionnaire ,each item is designed to assess a specific outcome domain .Each item was designed with a five -point rating scale ,a higher rating indicates better outcome .According to the subjects'self reported hearing difficulty when they were not wearing hearing aids (unaid-ed) ,the subjects were divided into two groupsself reported hearing difficulty to be no ,mild ,moderate group ,and self reported hearing difficulty to be moderately severe or severe group ,respectively .Templates for each group were established according to the analysis of the item ratings .Results One thousand two hundred and forty -seven sub-jects accept the investigation ,with a response rate of 72 .3% ,and 1203 completed responses were included in the fi-nal analysis .The Chinese version of IOI-HA scores showed a skewed distribution ,with a mean score ranging from 3 .52 to 4 .19 .The total IOI-HA scores ranged from 9 to 35 ,and the mean total score was 26 .30 .Results showed that for the self reported hearing difficulty (unaided) to be none ,mild or moderate group ,the mean scores for the i-tem of daily use ,benefit ,residual activity limitation ,satisfaction ,residual participation restrictions ,impact on others ,and quality of life were 4 .14 ,3 .67 ,3 .76 ,3 .58 ,3 .56 ,3 .93 and 3 .69 ,respectively .The corresponding mean scores for the self reported hearing difficulty (unaided) to be moderately severe or severe group were 4 .19 ,3 .63 ,3 .64 ,3 . 65 ,3 .52 ,3 .89 ,and 3 .79 ,respectively .A template for the Chinese IOI -HA was established according to the above data .Conclusion The template for the Chinese version of IOI -HA could be served as an effective tool to measure the general effectiveness of the hearing aid outcomes and hearing aid fitting in China ,which would also facilitate the international outcome comparison cross culture .