Hearing Sensitivity in Adults Screened for Selected Risk Factors

Abstract

As a means of partially distinguishing age effects and other risk factors in presbyacusis, hearing thresholds for 56– to 65–year-old participants screened for exclusion of selected risk factors were compared with thresholds for 48– to 55–year-old participants without the same risk factors. Hearing thresholds for both age groups were also compared with age-appropriate International Standards Organization (ISO) norms. Even after screening participants for exclusion of selected risk factors, differences in hearing sensitivity remained across age groups. Across the male and female groups, thresholds were generally better (lower) for 48 to 55 year olds than for 56 to 65 year olds. ISO norms generally underestimated the degree of hearing loss for participants of comparable age in the present study. The underestimation was small at lower test frequencies, was generally greater for men, and was largest at test frequencies above 2000 Hz. Abbreviations: ANSI = American National Standards Institute, EHLS = Epidemiology of Hearing Loss Study, ISO = International Standards Organization

High-frequency audiometry in young and older adults when conventional audiometry is normal

“…Women had lower thresholds compared to men, which coincides with a previous study done only with conventional frequencies (up to 8kHz). 18 Men had higher thresholds than women at frequencies above 3kHz. Literature shows that the beginning of the auditory sensitivity loss process has little effect on lower frequencies, affecting mostly higher frequencies in men.…”

“…2 , 5 , 20 , 24 , 25 In this study we show groups of older adults (45 to 55 years) with significantly worse pure-tone sensitivity compared to younger adults (25 to 35 years). Some papers report ages close to 40 years, 18 , 20 , 25 while another study 5 detected reduced auditory sensitivity in men aged 30 years. Following normal sensitivity criteria, all participants in our study had auditory thresholds within normal limits.…”

“…According to the authors, these findings 26 may be explained by men being more exposed to noise than women, which causes injury before age-associated hearing losses affect sensorial cells. A further study 18 tried to eliminate risk factors from its sample, including noise exposure, and assessed pure-tone sensitivity at 500 to 8,000Hz in two age groups. The age factor was seen at all frequencies, and gender was important at frequencies over 3,000Hz.…”

“…17 High-frequency audiometry (over 8kHz) is useful to measure cochlear function, diagnosing sensorial injury earlier than conventional audiometry. 18 Furthermore, high-frequency audiometry is a sensitive tool to differentiate groups of individuals classified by conventional audiometry as audiologically normal, in which one may have no hearing complaints (control group) and the other may present difficulties of speech recognition in noisy environments (test group). 19 Test group participants have been classified according to a range of clinical tests as having Obscure Auditory Dysfunction (OAD).…”

Estéreos pessoais: hábitos auditivos e avaliação audiológica

“…A caracterização dos hábitos auditivos da população alvo de uma campanha de prevenção auditiva é extremamente importante, assim como a realização de exames audiológicos, tais como audiometria de altas frequências (14) e emissões otoacústicas (15) , procedimentos utilizados na prática clínica não só para diagnóstico, mas também para prevenção de perdas auditivas, uma vez que podem revelar alterações iniciais no sistema auditivo não detectadas na audiometria convencional.…”