Topic Area 1 - Foundational Knowledge on HL Flashcards
Which two age-related changes in the outer ear might be seen in elderly individuals?
Why might those two changes result in artificial air-bone gaps?
(1) Collapsed ear canals
(2) Impacted cerumen
Because both of these changes would mimic conductive hearing loss, where the sound signal is unable to enter the inner ear for processing. These two changes impede the progress of the sound signal on its way into the inner ear.
What can be done to improve the accuracy of hearing testing in the face of two age-related changes?
Important to make sure that these two factors are not clouding the hearing testing process. Before you begin testing the hearing of an older adult, it would be important to clean their ear canals to make sure that there isn’t impacted cerumen, as well as using ear buds as opposed to using heavy over-ear phones that could contribute to the collapse of the outer ear canal.
What is the definition of presbycusis?
hearing loss associated with the aging process
What are the primary messages of Figure 12-4 with respect to hearing loss with increases in age, and with respect to men and women?
Figure 12-4 demonstrates clearly that as people age, their hearing is generally impacted at all frequencies (threshold required for hearing increases at all frequency levels for both genders), however high frequencies are affected more severely.
Men seem to experience a more dramatic HF hearing loss. All the age groups demonstrated a decrease in high frequencies. This could indicate noise-induced hearing loss, which may explain the more severe loss for men, as men have traditionally worked in more noisy environments.
Speech recognition typically accompanies presbycusis. In what condition is speech recognition exacerbated?
Dichotic listening tasks
Environments with severe reverberation
Discourse (as compared to single words)
Noisy Environments
Auditory processing difficulty also is experienced by some older individuals in addition to presbycusis and decreased speech recognition. Be able to recognize the kinds of listening difficulties older individuals might experience if they have auditory processing difficulties.
- Difficulty discriminating two sounds that differ in pitch, intensity, or duration
- Difficulty understanding time-compressed or frequency-filtered speech
- Dichotic listening tasks (i.e., when a competing signal is presented to one ear, and the target speech signal to the other)
- Environments with severe reverberation
Be able to recognize changes that are exhibited by an aging brain.
A loss of neurons
A reduction in the number of synaptic connections between neurons
Changes in the excitatory and inhibitory neurotransmitter systems
Changes in neural transmission along the auditory pathway
Possibly, changes in the cognitive processing of the acoustic signal e.g. information processing, labelling, retrieval and storage
A decrement in long-term and short-term memory
What is the prevalence of hearing loss globally? See page 17 and note this statement: “Globally, the WHO estimates that hearing loss is more prevalent than any other disabling condition (World Health Organization” [WHO 2008]
The prevalence of hearing loss globally in 2015 exceeds 700 million. (almost 10% of the world population)
What is the prevalence of hearing loss in adults?
The prevalence of hearing loss in adults is 19% for men between 48 and 59, and 7% for women of those same ages.
What is the prevalence of deafness in children?
The prevalence of prelingual deafness in children is 3/1000.
What are the two major causes of presbycusis?
Neurological changes (i.e., loss of sensory cells and supporting cells, nerve fibers, and neural tissue)
Hair cells may die
Cell bodies of auditory nerve may degenerate
Metabolic or strial (i.e., a change in the blood supply to the cochlea)
Membranes of cochlear tissues may thicken, occluding the capillaries and restricting blood supply
What are the primary categories of cause of prelingual hearing loss in children?
Idiopathic (25%)
Nongenetic (25%)
Genetic (50%)
- Nonsyndromic (70%)
- Syndromic (30%)
Nongenetic cause of prenatal/perinatal/postnatal sensorineural hearing loss
Prenatal- Interuterine infections: rubella, cytomegalovirus, HSV Complications associated with the Rh-factor Prematurity Maternal Diabetes Parental radiation Toxemia Anoxia Syphilis
Perinatal-
Anoxia during birth
Use of forceps might damage cochlea
Severe uterine contractions might damage cochlea
Postnatal-
Ototoxic drugs
Infections
Based on what Greg told you in class and what your text page 498-499 states, is Usher’s a nonsyndromic or syndromic genetic cause of deafness?
Usher’s is a syndromic genetic cause of deafness. It causes congenital sensorineural hearing loss and progressive loss of vision.
Based on what Marilyn told you in class, and what you might read here at this link: Information About Connexin, is Connexin a nonsyndromic or syndromic genetic cause of deafness?
Mutations in the connexion 26 gene GJB2 may cause recessive hereditary bilateral deafness/ hearing impairment. This gene is linked to nearly half of all cases of hereditary deafness. However, this does not appear to be syndromic, as there are no other associated factors.
