February 14, 2008

This week I saw few clients on Monday, but clinic was canceled today. I saw a really adorable 5 year old as part of her speech diagnostic on Monday. During the case history, the mother said that the little girl had PE tubes when she was a baby and they had dropped out around 10 months-1 year. The little girl had type B tymps in the left ear and type C in the right. Her pure tone air conduction thresholds reflected this, with the left ear thresholds being 5-10 dB poorer than the right ear. We recommended that the mother seek medical advice on how to alleviate the fluid in the little girl's ears.

I found a really interesting article on otitis media with effusion, hearing loss, and auditory processes at school age. The authors of the article wanted to examine the effect of conductive hearing loss secondary to otitis media with effusion in the first 3 years of life on physiologic peripheral, and higher-order behavioral auditory measures examined at school age. The authors found that there was a significant association of peripheral hearing loss at the school age if the children had OME. They also found that hearing loss in early life and OME were significantly associated with the acoustic middle ear muscle reflex. They also found significant correlation between early OME and early HL when examining ABR Wave V latency.

Reference:
Gravel, J.S., Roberts, J.E., Roush, J., Grose, J., Besing, J., Burchinal, M., Neebe, E., Wallace, I.F., and Zeisel, S. (2006). Early otitis media with effusion, hearing loss, and auditory processes at school age. Ear & Hearing (27) 4. 353-368.

If you would like to read this article, please copy the following link and paste it in your browser.
http://ovidsp.tx.ovid.com/spb/ovidweb.cgi?WebLinkFrameset=1&S=GHFAFPBKDGDDLEEENCILKHMJBMPPAA00&returnUrl=http%3a%2f%2fovidsp.tx.ovid.com%2fspb%2fovidweb.cgi%3f%26Full%2bText%3dL%257cS.sh.15.16%257c0%257c00003446-200608000-00004%26S%3dGHFAFPBKDGDDLEEENCILKHMJBMPPAA00&directlink=http%3a%2f%2fgraphics.tx.ovid.com%2fovftpdfs%2fFPDDNCMJKHEEDG00%2ffs046%2fovft%2flive%2fgv023%2f00003446%2f00003446-200608000-00004.pdf&filename=Early+Otitis+Media+with+Effusion%2c+Hearing+Loss%2c+and+Auditory+Processes+at+School+Age.

February 8, 2008

This week, I saw two individuals who had been referred from the speech and hearing screenings. One of the individuals who had been referred, did not have a hearing loss. After he left the screening it was determined that there was an equipment malfunction and that was the cause of his hearing loss. The other individual did actually have a documented hearing loss. He had thresholds within normal limits in the low frequencies through 2000-3000 Hz, and then sloping to a moderate-severe hearing loss.

I wanted to find an article about successful calibration of audiometric equipment. I didn't find exactly the article that I was wanting, but I did find one on the reference zero for the calibration of air-conduction audiometric equipment using 'tone bursts' as test signals. As discussed in the article, the aim of the study was to determine reference peak-to-peak threshold SPLs for AC sound transducers using groups of tone bursts as test signals. They studied how the repetition rate, type of sound transducer, gender and age of the test subjects, and reference pure tone thresholds effected the results. They found that the results depended mostly on the reference equivalent SPLs for pure tones of each sound transducer.

Reference:
Fedtke, T., and Richter, U. (2007). Reference zero for the calibration of air-conduction audiometric equipment using 'tone bursts' as test signals. International Journal of Audiology (46), 1-10.

If you would like to read this article, please visit the following website:
http://web.ebscohost.com/ehost/pdf?vid=32&hid=115&sid=1ecfa2f9-75bb-401d-8929-1949019a5180%40sessionmgr102

February 1, 2008

During the first week of clinic I saw quite a few Hearing Aid Checks. One of the client's was a man I followed all of last semester. He came in because he felt that his hearing had changed about two weeks before. He said that it had gotten worse, but was starting to get better. The client said he may have had a mini-stroke. We did a quick pure tone air conduction threshold search and found that his thresholds in the low frequencies had changed 20-35 dB HL. Due to the significant change, we recommended that he seek immediate medical attention.

I wanted to find an article related to stroke and hearing loss. I found an article about sudden deafness as a sign of stroke with normal diffusion-weighted brain MRI. Obviously, we do not perform the MRI; however, if a client were to come in with sudden deafness or a sudden change in hearing, as this client did, we would refer them to a PCP and they may request an MRI be completed. In this article, they stated that sudden deafness is typically caused by a viral inflammation of the labyrinth, if there are no associated neurological signs and symptoms. This study was based on a 60 year old man who had hypertension and the acute onset of sudden deafness and vertigo. After a brain MRI, they felt the sudden deafness with vertigo may have been a heralding manifestiation of a pontocerebellar infarction.


Reference:
Yi, H., Lee, S., Lee, H., Ahn, B., Park, B., & Whitman, G. (2005). Sudden deafness as a sign of stroke with normal diffusion-weighted brain MRI. Acta Oto-laryngologica (125) 1119-1121.

If you would like to read this article, please go to the following link:
http://web.ebscohost.com/ehost/pdf?vid=5&hid=115&sid=1ecfa2f9-75bb-401d-8929-1949019a5180%40sessionmgr102