Acclimatization In Wide Dynamic Range Multichannel Compression And Linear Amplification Hearing Aids

Main Category: Hearing / Deafness
Also Included In: Medical Devices / Diagnostics
Article Date: 12 Oct 2006 - 0:00 PDT

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We studied acclimatization in hearing-impaired patients with no previous hearing aid (HA) experience who were fit bilaterally with either wide dynamic range multichannel compression (WDRMCC) or linear amplification (LA) HAs.

Throughout 32 weeks of normal HA use, we monitored changes in nonsense syllable perception in speechspectrum noise. Syllable recognition for WDRMCC users improved by 4.6% over the first 8 weeks, but the 2.2% improvement for LA users was complete in 2 to 4 weeks.

Consonant confusion analyses indicated that WDRMCC experience facilitated consonant identification, while LA users primarily changed their response biases.

These results provide evidence for acclimatization in new users of WDRMCC HAs but not in new users of LA HAs. Acclimatization depended on the type of amplification and on the previous amplification experience.

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