Document Type : Original Articles

Authors

• Mahsa Bakhit ¹
• Nematolah Rohbakhsh ²
• Maryam Delphi ¹

¹ Academic Member, Department of Audiology, Musculoskeletal Rehabilitation Research Center, School of Rehabilitation, Ahvaz Jundishapur University of Medical Sciences, Ahvaz, Iran

² Academic Member, Department of Audiology, School of Rehabilitation, Tehran University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran

Abstract

Introduction: There are two basic terms relating to hearing loss. One is Hearing Impairment which refers to the complete or partial loss of hearing function. Hearing Disability, on the other hand, mostly targets the mental and psychological effects of hearing loss. Questionnaires as one of the simplest tests known to audiologists are practical tools to evaluate hearing disability.Materials and Methods: Thirty Eight hearing impaired patients including 21 men and 17 women aged 20 to 65 years old participated in this study. Hearing loss was ranged from slight to profound. Basic audiology evaluations including otoscopy, pure tone audiometry, tympanometry, and speech discrimination score were performed for all subjects then Denver Questionnaire was completed by participants. To compare the data, the score of each questionnaire was then compared with Average Pure tone audiometric Thresholds.Results: The results clearly showed that the hearing loss was positively related to the questionnaire score in each subject (P < 0.05).Conclusion: Quantified Denver Scale of Communication Function has a great consistency with pure tone audiometry and it could be useful in evaluating hearing disability.Keywords: Questionnaire, Hearing disability, Quantified Denver Scale of Communication Function