Active clinical trials for "Hearing Loss, Sensorineural"

Sensorineural hearing loss (SNHL) is among the most prevalent chronic conditions in aging and has a profoundly negative effect on speech comprehension, leading to increased social isolation, reduced quality of life, and increased risk for the development of dementia in older adulthood. Typical audiological tests and interventions, which focus on measuring and restoring audibility, do not explain the full range of cognitive difficulties that adults with hearing loss experience in speech comprehension. For example, adults with SNHL have to work disproportionally harder to decode acoustically degraded speech. That additional effort is thought to diminish shared executive and attentional resources for higher-level language processes, impacting subsequent comprehension and memory, even when speech is completely intelligible. This phenomenon has been referred to as listening effort (LE). There is a growing understanding that these cognitive factors are a critical and often "hidden effect" of hearing loss. At the same time, the effects of LE on the neural mechanisms of language processing and memory in SNHL are currently not well understood. In order to develop evidence-based assessments and interventions to improve comprehension and memory in SNHL, it is critical that we elucidate the cognitive and neural mechanisms of LE and its consequences for speech comprehension. In this project, we adopt a multi-method approach, combining methods from clinical audiology, psycholinguistics, and cognitive neuroscience to address this gap of knowledge. Specifically, we adopt a novel and innovative method of co-registering pupillometry (a reliable physiological measure of LE) and language-related event-related brain potential (ERP) measures during real-time speech processing to characterize the effects of clear speech (i.e., a listener-oriented speaking style that is spontaneously adopted to improve intelligibility when speakers are aware of a perception difficulty on behalf of the listener) on high-level language processes (e.g., semantic retrieval, syntactic integration) and subsequent speech memory in older adults with SNHL. This innovative work addresses a time-sensitive gap in the literature regarding the identification of objective and reliable markers of specific neurocognitive processes impacted by speech clarity and LE in age-related SNHL.

Main objective: Investigate on new cochlear implanted patients whether the FineHearing strategy of the MED-EL cochlear implant gives better results on musical perception if the depth of stimulation (stimulation or not of the apical areas) is greater. Secondary objectives: Evaluate the effect of stimulation depth on vocal audiometric results, results of differential frequency threshold test and on qualitative sound perception.

Normal-hearing participants aged 18-25 with and without musical training will listen to a series of short musical samples that have been recorded through hearing aids. The music will be played at a comfortable listening level. Subjects will use the computer to rate the sound quality of the music on a 7-point Likert scale.

The goal of this study is to investigate the role of social factors on speech learning, including production and perception, in infants ranging in age from ~7-18 months. Infants have either typical hearing or sensorineural hearing loss. The main prediction of the study is that social reinforcement will engender improvements in vocal learning above and beyond gains in hearing in infants with hearing loss. As part of this study: The parent and infant engage in a free play session in the playroom while the investigator cues the parent to say simple nonsense words; Infants hear playback of the same words during a second phase.

An evaluation of Cochlear's cochlear implant electrode array which passively elutes dexamethasone for a defined period of time to help reduce inflammatory responses.

Hearing loss and cognitive impairment both appear in elderly patients. The goal was to use a modified screening method added to already established cognitive tests to obtain a standardized test for detection of cognitive impairment in patients with hearing loss. The aim of this study is to collect data with neuropsychological tests using questionnaires and to determine cognitive impairment in patients with hearing loss. The collected data will be evaluated using SPSS 23. The corrected item-total correlation and item difficulty of the item DemTectEar will be assessed by item analysis / Cronbachs' Alpha. For further evaluation and comparisons two-sided t-tests with a level of significance 0.05 or Mann-Whitney-U-tests will be performed.

New discoveries for hearing loss intervention are often impeded by the proprietary nature of commercial hearing aids and their use in scientific research as "black boxes". An open-source speech platform (OSP) was developed to bridge the gap between audiology research and commercial hearing aid features, to promote innovative solutions to meet the needs of the hearing loss community. The OSP can replicate functions found in commercial hearing aids, and provides tools to researchers to access those functions. The purpose of this study is to evaluate portable and cloud-based platforms of the OSP that will enable a wide range of lab and field applications. All human subjects-related activities will be conducted at Northwestern University (single-site study).

The overall goal of this study is to determine the clinical benefit and safety of antiviral therapy for asymptomatic congenital cytomegalovirus (cCMV) infected hearing-impaired infants. We will conduct a multi-center double-blind randomized placebo-controlled trial to determine whether hearing-impaired infants with asymptomatic cCMV have better hearing and language outcomes if they receive valganciclovir antiviral treatment. We will also determine the safety of antiviral valganciclovir therapy for asymptomatic cCMV-infected hearing impaired infants. This study will be unique in that the cohort enrolled will only include hearing-impaired infants with asymptomatic cCMV. Primary Objective: To determine if treatment of cCMV-infected hearing impaired infants with isolated hearing loss with the antiviral drug valganciclovir reduces the mean slope of total hearing thresholds over the 20 months after randomization compared to untreated cCMV-infected infants with isolated hearing loss. Main Secondary Objectives: To determine if valganciclovir treatment improves the following outcomes when compared to the control group: The slope of best ear hearing thresholds over the 20 months after randomization. The MacArthur-Bates Communicative Development Inventory (CDI) percentile score for words produced at 20 months of age. To evaluate safety measures based on all grade 3 or greater new adverse events designated by the NIAID Division of AIDS (DAIDS) toxicity tables.

In France, children cochlear implantation (CI) is performed 400 times per year. Causes of profound sensorineural hearing loss (SNHL) are represented by congenital malformation of the inner ear for 50 to 60%. Most of the remaining cases of CI in children are caused by congenital CMV infection. The proportion of CMV inducing SNHL with a CI in children is not clearly defined. During CI, we aim to collect a very small sample of perilymphatic fluid and to analyse it with a CMV polymerised-chain-reaction to evaluate the involvement of CMV in SNHL.

Purpose: Routine clinical care and pilot study data has shown evidence of postoperative hearing preservation in pediatric cochlear implant (CI) recipients. The primary aim of this study is to investigate speech perception performance in pediatric CI recipients with functional pre-operative hearing. Participants: Two cohorts of CI recipients aged 6 through 17 years who had pre-operative low frequency residual hearing. Subjects in Arm 1 will present with a post-operative low frequency pure tone average (125, 250, and 500 Hz) of ≤ 75 dB HL, and those in Arm 2 will present with a post-operative low frequency pure tone average (LFPTA) that exceeds 75 dB HL. Procedures (methods): Subjects will complete speech perception and quality of life testing during post-operative intervals. Subjects in Arm 1 will be evaluated with the hearing aid alone (HA-alone) and with combined electric-acoustic stimulation (EAS). Subjects in Arm 2 will be evaluated with the CI-alone.