Active clinical trials for "Hearing Loss"

The purpose of this study is to develop and test a multicomponent hearing care intervention for the PACE staff members in order to learn more about communication and engagement.

The research team will evaluate pupillary dilation from vagal nerve stimulation of Arnold's Nerve, a branch of the vagus nerve, during routine cochlear implantation surgery.

Children who are deaf or hard-of-hearing (D/HH) are at risk of speech and language delays, which can be mitigated through early identification and intervention. Identifying hearing loss (HL) during preschool is crucial, but the most effective hearing screening method for preschoolers remains uncertain. The purpose of this study is to learn whether, compared to the gold-standard two-stage Pure-tone audiometry (PTA) + otoacoustic emissions (OAE) screening (TS-PO), single-stage OAE (SS-O) screening alone is not inferior at identifying hearing loss when performed in a community-based preschool setting. This study holds the potential to improve early hearing loss detection and intervention among D/HH children, reducing the likelihood of speech and language delays. A diverse group of 28,000 preschool-age children across community-based preschool centers will be recruited. The intervention involves all subjects undergoing both PTA and OAE screening, with the order determined through randomization. Children who show potential hearing issues based on screening results or teacher concerns will receive further testing to determine the final hearing outcome. Group allocation will be post-hoc, based on their screening results. In addition to the primary objective, the study will compare other hearing screening measures and outcomes between the two methods (TS-PO and SS-O). This approach aims to reflect the real-life effectiveness of hearing screening in a diverse population. Ultimately, the study seeks to provide insights into an optimal hearing screening method that could prevent speech and language delays among D/HH children.

Neural stimulation with photons has been proposed for a next generation of cochlear implants (CIs). The potential benefit of photonic over electrical stimulation is its spatially selective activation of small populations of spiral ganglion neurons (SGNs). Stimulating smaller neuron populations along the cochlea provides a larger number of independent channels to encode acoustic information. Hearing could therefore be restored at a higher fidelity and performance in noisy listening environments as well as music appreciation are likely to improve . While it has been demonstrated that optical radiation evokes auditory responses in animal models, it is not clear whether the radiant exposures used in the animal experiments are sufficient to stimulate the auditory system of humans. The proposed tests are: to demonstrate that light delivery systems (LDSs) can be inserted and oriented optimally in the human cochlea. to show that the LDSs are able to deliver sufficient amount of energy to evoke a compound action potential of the auditory nerve. to validate that the fluence rate (energy / target area) required for stimulation is below the maximal fluence rate, which damaged the cochlea in animal experiments. to show that combined optical and electrical stimulation is able to significantly lower the threshold required for optical stimulation in humans. The endpoints for the study are either the completion of the experiments proposed or the demonstration that not sufficient energy can be delivered safely in the human cochlea to develop an action potential.

Older adults who use cochlear implants to address hearing loss show wide variation in benefit. This research investigates the role of normal aging, the health of peripheral and central auditory pathways, and positioning of the cochlear implant electrode array in contributing to this variability. A range of input types from simple auditory signals to spoken sentences is used to examine these questions.

Many individuals with hearing loss do not receive adequate hearing healthcare. Given their close and long-term relationships with patients, primary care providers (PCPs) could play a vital role in improving access to hearing healthcare. Unfortunately, hearing loss is often underdiagnosed in primary care settings, because hearing screening is not a routine part of primary care visits, and the responsibility often falls on the patient or family to recognize and address the issue. The investigators propose to pilot test the use of text message reminders to encourage elderly patients to discuss hearing assessment with there PCPs. The study objectives are to: 1) design an automated text-messaging reminder system; 2) assess the feasibility of deploying the intervention in a clinical trial setting; and 3) evaluate whether the intervention increases willingness to seek hearing healthcare.

In their day to day, persons do from simple to more or less complicated tasks and activities (ie: stand from a chair, open a door, shopping, read, drive, play chess, remind an appointment...). Such ability to do things is called capacity. Intrinsic capacity is the combination of all the physical and mental capacities that a person has, and reach its maximum in the early adulthood and then declines as the person ages. Each kind of capacity declines at her own speed (which may be faster or slower according to each person lifestyle), and once drops below a threshold may lead to a reduction in quality of life and loss of autonomy. Nevertheless there are some actions that may be effective to prevent or slow such decline. To do so the investigators have design an intervention that combines several things of different nature (what is know as a complex intervention) called AMICOPE. The AMICOPE intervention is performed in the community or in primary care centers through 12 weekly group sessions of 2 h 30 min which combine structured and adapted physical activity, group dynamics to promote social support and address loneliness, social isolation and depressive symptoms, and dietary advice. Our study is addressed to persons over 70 with light problems in mobility, nutrition or mood state. The purpose of this study is to assess if the AMICOPE intervention is better than the standard advice to follow healthy lifestyles to improve or maintain self-perceived health, mobility, nutritional status an psychological wellbeing.

Severe-to-profound hearing loss can have a major impact on patients´ lives leading to social isolation and decreased quality of life. Most commonly the hearing loss is caused by damage to the inner ear or cochlear nerve. Since the vestibular system which is central for our balance is located in the inner ear it can be suspected that patients with severe-to-profound hearing loss also might have an impaired vestibular function. This impairment may lead to a feeling of dizziness or vertigo. This study aims to investigate if patients with severe-to-profound hearing loss also have impaired vestibular function. The vestibular function will be measured with caloric irrigation, video head impulse test and vestibular evoked myogenic potential.

The purpose of the current study is to measure oxygenation in the PFC using fNIRS in a sample of older adults with hearing loss. Adults with hearing loss will be asked to repeat the final word from low-context sentences in noise at two SNRs; a hard SNR (individually-measured SNR-50), and an easy SNR (SNR-50 + 10 dB) both without and with hearing aids set to a directional mode. The procedure will be a within-subject repeated measures. Stimuli will be randomized.

Cochlear implantation is performed in children with sensorineural hearing loss to restore hearing. Fifty percent of children with sensory neural hearing loss, who are candidates for cochlear implant, have vestibular (inner ear) dysfunction prior to surgery. Anatomically, the cochlea, semicircular canals, and otolith organs are located in close proximity in the inner ear and any procedure in the cochlea may affect the vestibular system, resulting in subsequent balance impairment. In addition, the process of implantation often results in further suppression of vestibular function necessary to develop normal balance. Vestibular dysfunction predisposes these children to balance impairments that can affect the normal development of gross motor skills such as sitting, standing, and walking. These balance and gross motor deficits may predispose the child to difficulties with safe community participation resulting in lower quality of life for the child and family. Evidence in the literature suggests that children with vestibular loss do not recover to the same levels as their peers, especially in the area of activities requiring vestibular input for balance. The purpose of this descriptive study is to examine balance, vestibular function, and gross motor skills in children following cochlear implantation over a period of one year. Children, ages 1 year to 5 years will be tested post cochlear implant , and at 6 and 12 months subsequent to initial testing, using clinically based tests of vestibular impairment (head impulse test, post rotary nystagmus or head shake nystagmus), balance (Pediatric Balance Scale) and gross motor skill development (Peabody Developmental Motor Scales, 2nd edition). Quality of life will be assessed using the Life-H (Assessment of Life Habits).