Persons with impaired hearing who are candidates for amplification are not all equally
successful with hearing aids in daily living. Having the ability to predict success
with amplification in everyday life from measures that can be obtained during an initial
evaluation of the patient's candidacy would result in greater patient satisfaction
with hearing aids and more efficient use of clinical resources. This study investigated
the relationship between various demographic and audiometric measures, and two measures
of hearing aid success in 50 hearing aid wearers. Audiometric predictors included
measures of audibility and suprathreshold distortion. The unaided and aided signal-to-noise
ratio (SNR) loss on the QuickSIN test provided the best predictors of hearing aid
success in daily living. However, much of this predictive relationship appeared attributable
to the patient's age.
Key Words
Age - audiometric variables - everyday success - hearing aids - prediction
