title: Relations between electric response audiometry, conventional audiometry and psychodiagnostic examinations in hearing-impaired children.
abstract: To obtain a more objective determination of the hearing loss and thereby a more effective therapy, we compared the results of conventional audiometry (reflex and behavioural audiometry) with electric response audiometry (ERA) results in 522 children whose median age was 3 years. ERA threshold was more sensitive at 10.8 +/- 17.5 dB. The mean difference and its standard deviation are both much greater for the younger children and particularly for non-cooperative children, but neither relates clearly to intelligence. In the case of 'difficult-to-test' children (due to behavioural disturbance, mental retardation or brain damage), we carried out a psychological examination consisting of several special non-verbal tests. 62.7% of children with IQs under 70 needed sedation; for the children whose IQs lay above 70, this proportion was only 37.3%. Our artefact rejection system greatly reduced the percentage of sedations required, particularly for children under 3 years of age.
mesh_terms: D000367:Age Factors; D001299:Audiometry; D001309:Auditory Threshold; D001925:Brain Damage, Chronic / Q000150:complications; D002648:Child; D002675:Child, Preschool; D004558:Electric Stimulation; D006311:Hearing Disorders / Q000150:complications / Q000175:diagnosis*; D006801:Humans; D007223:Infant; D007360:Intelligence; D011571:Psychoacoustics