Hearing Aid Use and Mild Hearing Impairment: Learnings from Big Data

Area of Science:

• Audiology
• Hearing Science
• Rehabilitation Engineering

Background:

• Previous research on hearing aid (HA) use and hearing impairment (HI) primarily relied on self-reports.
• Large-scale investigations using objective data-logged HA use and HI severity are lacking.

Purpose of the Study:

• To compare objective measures of daily HA use between adults with mild HI and moderate HI.
• To examine HA usage patterns in different listening environments for these groups.

Main Methods:

• Retrospective analysis of data from 8,489 bilateral HA fittings of adults (≥18 years) from an international provider database (2013-2014).
• Participants were categorized into mild and moderate HI groups based on audiometric criteria.
• Objective HA usage data (hours per day) were analyzed, controlling for age and gender.

Main Results:

• Average daily HA use was approximately 8.5 hours for both mild and moderate HI groups.
• No significant differences in overall HA use were found between mild and moderate HI.
• HA use was predominantly in quiet environments (7 hours/day) versus noisy environments (1 hour/day).

Conclusions:

• Adults with mild HI demonstrate similar hearing aid usage frequency as those with moderate HI.
• These objective findings support the clinical recommendation of hearing aids for individuals with milder hearing loss.
• HA usage patterns did not significantly vary with age, gender, or HA style.