Effectiveness of low-cut modified amplification strategy and channel-free hearing aid in individuals with auditory neuropathy spectrum disorder

Abstract

Objective: The present study attempted to compare the aided benefit using low-cut modified amplification and channel-free hearing aids in individuals with auditory neuropathy spectrum disorder (ANSD). It was also attempted to determine these effects in good and poor performers with ANSD. Design: Cross-sectional within group pretest, post-test design. Study sample: Twenty-five individuals with acquired ANSD were selected for the study. The study sample included 11 males and 14 females between the age ranges of 17–40 years (mean age of 24.6 years). Results: The results of the repeated measures analysis of variance (ANOVA) showed that aided benefit was significantly higher with the channel-free hearing aid. Mixed ANOVA results showed that the improvement was more in good performers than poor performers with ANSD. Multiple regression analyses showed that speech identification scores are a strong predictor of aided benefit. Conclusions: The results of the present study suggest that channel-free hearing aids and low-cut modified amplification can be used as an efficient alternative technique during hearing aid fitting for individuals with ANSD. However, further evidence-based studies on a larger group are essential to validate the results.