November 2, 2007

This week I saw several clients. One of which was a printing services employee. While looking back through her chart, I noticed an ABR had been performed on her here at the clinic a number of years ago. We do not routinely perform ABR's, so I thought that was interesting that we had a record of performing one. Apparently, the equipment was new at the time, therefore they were practicing using it. I also got to follow up with a client who came for his initial visit at the beginning of the semester. He came in to pick up his new hearing aids and seemed pleased with them. We did not make any adjustments at that time. He was scheduled for a follow-up appointment in 2 weeks.

So since I saw the ABR testing in the one client's chart, I thought it would be interesting to find an article about ABR's. I found an article comparing the effects of broadband masking noise on the auditory brainstem response in young and older adults. The researchers were wanting to determine the effects of ipsilateral-direct, continuous, broadband noise on ABR wave I and V latencies and amplitude in young adult versus older adult humans. They thought that age may influence the effects of masking noise on ABR peak latencies and or amplitudes. The younger adults had hearing thresholds within normal limits, while some of the older adults had hearing thresholds within normal limits, but some had thresholds up to 45 dB HL. The results from this study found that peak amplituded decreased with increasing noise level and mean amplitudes were smaller for the older group. They also found that the effects of ipsilateral-direct masking noise on the click-evoked ABR were similar for the young and older adults.

Reference:
Burkard, R.F. and Sims, D. (2002). A comparison of the effects of broadband masking noise on the auditory brainstem response in young and older adults. American Journal of Audiology (11) 13-22.

If you would like to read this article, please use the following link:
http://aja.asha.org/cgi/reprint/11/1/13?maxtoshow=