A very basic introduction to hearing aids.

A hearing aid is designed to bring sounds, especially speech, more effectively to the ear of a person with hearing loss. Typically a person with sensorineural deafness has a raising of thresholds of hearing and the basic principles of how the aid may overcome the loss is described.

A controlled study of tinnitus masking.

As part of a multi-centre study on tinnitus maskers, a controlled study with random allocation of patients to treatment groups was performed. The two therapists subdivided the patients according to whether or not they experienced hearing difficulties in addition to their tinnitus. Those with no hearing difficulties were randomly assigned to a control group with no instrumental treatment, or to treatment with one of two types of masker. Those with hearing difficulties were assigned to hearing aid, combination instrument, or masker treatment. No significant differences were found between treatment groups for those with no hearing difficulties. The differences between treatment groups for those fitted with maskers were small, but tended to indicate increased benefit derived from maskers. A number of interesting inter-therapist effects were found.

Attention, eye closure and the acoustic reflex.

The first part of this study considered the effects of differing states of attention on the acoustic reflex response. Tasks directing attention towards and away from the acoustic stimuli were compared with a neutral task. A significant reduction in reflex response magnitude was associated with the task directing attention away from the stimulus. The stimulus-directing task did not significantly affect the acoustic reflex response. The second part of the study investigated the effect of eye closure on the acoustic reflex response. The results showed an increase in reflex response magnitude with eye closure but not with darkness alone. This implied that the increase was associated with the muscular effort involved in eye closure.

A clinical study of tinnitus maskers.

This report describes a three-centre study of the effectiveness of tinnitus maskers, combination instruments (masker plus hearing aid), and hearing aids in the management of tinnitus. Some 472 patients entered the study with 382 reaching the first evaluation session after a minimum period of 6 months from fitting, and 206 reaching the second evaluation not less than 6 months after the first. The study included two control groups, by which to assess the comparative benefit to be derived solely from the investigation and counselling of such patients. The principal results were as follows: thorough investigation and careful counselling do much to help the patient; much further benefit is given by tinnitus masking instruments of various kinds; maskers are more often effective than hearing aids, although the latter are frequently the most appropriate first treatment of those patients who have substantial (but not yet treated or insufficiently treated) hearing difficulties as well; there is no evidence of masking having any harmful effect on hearing. None of the audiometric or tinnitus tests currently employed can be regarded as predictive, either of tinnitus severity, or of the eventual outcome of masking therapy, however certain measurements may help as a guide to patient management.