Hearing aid troubleshooting based on patients' descriptions.
Clinical audiologists were surveyed to determine the terms that their patients use to describe their reaction to hearing aid fitting problems. From this survey, a vocabulary of 40 frequently reported terms was developed. A second survey of hearing aid fitting experts was conducted to determine their methods of troubleshooting a hearing aid fitting when the patient reports one of the frequently reported terms. There was a high degree of agreement among the 24 experts. Principal components analysis resulted in ten components that explained 90.8% of the variance in the experts' responses. These results can be applied as an expert system for fine-tuning hearing aid fittings.
Jenstad
Lorienne M
LM
National Centre for Audiology, School of Communication Sciences and Disorders, University of Western Ontario, London, ON, Canada. lmj3@u.washington.edu
Van Tasell
Dianne J
DJ
Ewert
Chiquita
C
D012048:Correction of Hearing Impairment / Q000379:methods*; D004867:Equipment Design; D005103:Expert Systems; D005163:Factor Analysis, Statistical; D005260:Female; D006310:Hearing Aids / Q000592:standards; D006801:Humans; D008144:Loudness Perception; D008297:Male; D010898:Pitch Perception; D013017:Sound Localization; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires; D014584:User-Computer Interface