title: Quality of life improvement for bone-anchored  hearing aid users and their partners.
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  Bone-anchored hearing aid recipients experience well documented improvements in their audiometric performance and quality of life. While hearing aid recipients may understate their functional improvement, their partners may be more aware of such improvement. We sought to investigate patients' partners' perceptions of functional improvement following bone-anchored hearing aid fitting.
  
  
  METHODS
  Surveys were sent to 153 patients who had received a bone-anchored hearing aid through the Nova Scotia bone-anchored hearing aid programme. The validated survey asked patients' partners to give their subjective impression of the bone-anchored hearing aid recipient's functional status.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Surveys were completed by 90 patients (58.8 per cent), of whom 72 reported having a partner. Partners reported a significant improvement in hearing (p ≤ 0.0001). Partners reported improvement in 87.0 per cent of functional scenarios, no change in 12.6 per cent, and a decline in 0.4 per cent. These findings demonstrate a significant improvement in the emotional and social effects of hearing impairment, as perceived by bone-anchored hearing aid recipients' partners.
authors: Division of Otolaryngology, Department of Surgery, Dalhousie University, Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada.
authors: M L
authors: ML
authors: McNeil
authors: M
authors: M
authors: Gulliver
authors: D P
authors: DP
authors: Morris
authors: M
authors: M
authors: Bance
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D001301:Audiometry, Pure-Tone / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D001844:Bone Conduction / Q000502:physiology; D006310:Hearing Aids / Q000523:psychology*; D034381:Hearing Loss / Q000523:psychology / Q000534:rehabilitation*; D006801:Humans; D017063:Outcome Assessment, Health Care / Q000379:methods*; D017060:Patient Satisfaction; D011788:Quality of Life; D018454:Spouses; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires; D053441:Suture Anchors