Training in Wideband Tympanometry
Wideband Tympanometry in children with Down Syndrome
Description
Summary of: Hunter, L. L., Keefe, D. H., Feeney, M. P., Brown, D. K., Meinzen-Derr, J., Elsayed, A. M., Amann, J. M., Manickam, V., Fitzpatrick, D., & Shott, S. R. (2017). Wideband acoustic immittance in children with Down syndrome: prediction of middle-ear dysfunction, conductive hearing loss and patent PE tubes. International journal of audiology, 56(9), 622–634. https://doi.org/10.1080/14992027.2017.1314557
Middle ear disease is common in children with Down syndrome. This study aimed to look at absorbance measured at peak tympanic pressure by wideband tympanometry in children with Down syndrome and in children with typical development. The authors were interested into two key areas. Firstly the ability of wideband tympanometry to differentiate between conductive hearing loss and normal hearing in these two groups. Secondly they aimed to see the effect of patent pressure equalisation tubes on absorbance measurements. The results showed that normal hearing children with Down syndrome had absorbance characteristics that were similar to children without Down syndrome with normal hearing. Secondly, they showed Children with Down syndrome and conductive hearing loss had similar absorbance characteristics to their normally developing peers with conductive hearing loss. Lastly, they showed that children with patent pressure-equalizing tubes PETs) had significantly higher absorbance in the low frequency region for both typically developing and Down syndrome groups. They conclude wideband tympanometry is able to distinguish ears with conductive hearing loss and intact eardrums from ears with patent PETs on the basis of wideband patterns in the low frequencies.
