The Clinical Use of Personal Hearing Amplifiers in Facilitating Accessible Patient-Provider Communication: A Scoping Review
Journal of the American Geriatrics Society
Koerber, R. M., Kokorelias, K. M., et al. (2024).
Journal of the American Geriatrics Society, 72(7), 2195-2205.
<div>This scoping review investigates the effects of personal hearing amplifiers (PHAs) on communication in inpatient and outpatient clinical settings for adult patients with hearing loss.</div>
Sinai Health's Healthy Ageing and Geriatrics Program Research Fund (Canada)
1980 to August 31, 2022
<div>Empirical, peer-reviewed studies. Excludes single case studies.</div>
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<div>Across clinical settings, PHAs improved communication interactions between adult patients with hearing loss and their healthcare providers. Specifically, PHAs improved speech understanding (6/6 studies).</div>
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<div>Facilitators to PHA use included the brevity of screening and training needed for implementation. Barriers included tracking and maintaining the device, care providers not consistently utilizing the device, and patients with dementia forgetting how to operate the device. </div>
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<div>Limitations of this review include the possible exclusion of relevant studies and the lack of quality assessment of the included studies. Additional research is needed to improve the validity and comparability of study findings.</div>
<div>Satisfaction with PHAs varied by setting and user as follows:</div>
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<li>Care providers reported high satisfaction when using PHAs (4/4 studies).</li>
<li>Patients reported satisfaction when using PHAs in the acute care setting (5/5 studies).</li>
<li>Patients with dementia reported dissatisfaction with PHAs in long-term care settings (1/1 study).</li>
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<div>Limitations of this review include the possible exclusion of relevant studies and the lack of quality assessment of the included studies. Additional research is needed to improve the validity and comparability of study findings.</div>
