Use of Frequency Compression in Severe-profound Hearing Loss Adults (FC)

University College London (UCL)

Status: Completed

Conditions: Frequency Compression; Severe-profound Hearing Impairment

Treatments: Device: Hearing aid feature: Frequency Compression

Study type: Interventional

Funder types: Other

Identifiers

NCT04623112

15/0217

Details and patient eligibility

About

The purpose of this study is to investigate the functional benefits of frequency compression vs no frequency compression or fitted to hearing loss in severe-profound hearing impaired adults with high frequency hearing losses. Thus, assessing whether hearing aids for this patient population can be adapted to improve speech perception.

Full description

Frequency compression is a feature available on some digital hearing aids, which is aimed at increasing the audibility of high frequency sounds. It works by taking sounds above a fixed start frequency and compresses it into lower frequencies where residual hearing is better.

Enrollment: 27 patients

Sex: All

Ages: 18+ years old

Volunteers: No Healthy Volunteers

Inclusion criteria

1. Participants must be over 18 years of age- This study is looking at the use of frequency compression & its effects of speech perception in adults.
2. No ear surgery that would make it impossible to fit a hearing aid- To ensure limited confounding variables.
3. No history of ear surgery within the last 12 months- To ensure limited confounding variables.
4. No history of ear infection(s) within the last 6 months- To ensure no contraindications and limited confounding variables to testing.
5. No otoscopic abnormality making it impossible to fit a hearing aid- To ensure no contraindications to testing.
6. Bilateral severe-profound hearing impairment with air conduction thresholds >71dBHL within the frequency range of 250Hz to 4 kHz- To analyse the effects of frequency compression on speech perception within this patient population.
7. Post lingual deafness, with good spoken English- To ensure reliability of speech testing.
8. Previous bilateral digital hearing aid experience (6+ months)- To ensure limited confounding variables.
9. Written consent required.

Exclusion criteria

1. Participants under the age of 18 years.
2. History of ear surgery making it impossible to fit a hearing aid.
3. History of ear surgery within the last 12 months.

Trial design

Primary purpose: Treatment

Allocation: Randomized

Interventional model: Parallel Assignment

Masking: Single Blind

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27 participants in 3 patient groups

FC Deactivated

Other group

Description:

Frequency Compression feature on hearing aids is deactivated for 4 weeks

Treatment:

Device: Hearing aid feature: Frequency Compression

FC activated & set to default

Experimental group

Description:

Frequency compression feature activated on hearing aids and set to default software settings for 4 weeks.

Treatment:

Device: Hearing aid feature: Frequency Compression

FC activated and set to hearing loss

Experimental group

Description:

Frequency Compression feature activated on hearing aids and set to hearing loss cut-off for 4 weeks

Treatment:

Device: Hearing aid feature: Frequency Compression