- Ever wonder what to expect when receiving a hearing test?
Well, in this video, I'm gonna cover the five
evaluations that a hearing care professional will use
to test your hearing, coming up.
(lively music)
Hi guys, Cliff Olson, Doctor of Audiology
and founder of Applied Hearing Solutions in Anthem, Arizona.
And on this channel, I cover a much of
hearing related information to help make you
a better informed consumer.
So if you're into that, consider
hitting the subscribe button.
Chances are, the last time you had your hearing test,
it was back in grade school and that wasn't
even a full hearing test, it was just
a routine hearing screening.
Which is crazy because for years, individuals
have been recommended to get routine dental cleanings
and vision checks, but not routine hearing evaluations.
But with the rising concerns of how hearing loss impacts
not only communication ability, but cognitive function,
hearing tests are actually being recommended more often.
It's actually recommended to have your hearing tested
as an adult, every five years.
But if you've had a confirmed hearing loss,
you should be getting your hearing tested every year.
So what do we are actually evaluating
when you come in to have your hearing test.
Well basically, we're looking at the three
different parts of your ear, the outer ear,
the middle ear and the inner ear.
The outer ear is made up of your pinna
and your ear canal, all the way down to your ear drum.
The middle ear is made up of your tympanic membrane,
otherwise known as your ear drum,
the middle ear cavity space, the ossicles
or the three bones of hearing and the eustachian tube.
The inner ear is made up of the semicircular canals
which control balance and the cochlear,
which controls hearing function,
I also call this your hearing organ.
Now that you know what we're testing,
I'm gonna show you the five different things
that we will use in order to evaluate
the three different parts of your ear.
The first thing we do, is perform otoscopy.
This is where we evaluate your outer ear
by using an ear light or an otoscope
to look inside of your ear canals.
We do this to see if there's any obstructions
and to visualize the ear drum.
It may result in removal of earwax or some other
foreign object and possibly a referral
to an A&T if there's a perforation in the ear drum.
Once your ear canal is cleared,
you can continue on with the hearing test.
The second thing that we will do, is air conduction testing.
This is where a hearing care professional
will put headphones on your ears or inserts in your ears.
They will play you beeps, for you
to click a button or raise your hand.
Trying to find the very softest sound
that you can hear from low pitches,
mid pitches and high pitches.
This evaluates all three parts of your ear
at the same time because sound has to travel
from the outer ear, through the middle ear,
to the inner ear, for us to be able
to determine if you can hear the sound.
These are indicated by the Xs and Os
that you'll see on your hearing test.
The third part is bone conduction testing.
This is where a hearing care professional
will place a bone conduction device on your head,
that sends vibration directly through
your skull, into your inner ear.
This vibration of the hair cells in your cochlear,
will cause you to hear the same beeps
that you will hear when you wear
the headphones or the inserts.
But because this vibration bypasses your outer ear
and middle ear, it only tests your inner ear.
It can provide valuable insight
into what is causing your hearing loss
and where that hearing loss is located.
Bone conduction scores are indicated
by the brackets on the hearing test.
The fourth part of your comprehensive hearing evaluation
is speech recognition testing.
This is where a hearing care professional
either say or play recorded words for you to repeat.
The words will get softer and softer
until we identify the lowest volume
that we can play a word and still have
you understand what word is being said.
The score of this test is used to cross check
with your ear conduction testing
and is indicated in the speech test
score results on your hearing evaluation.
The fifth and final part of your hearing test
is your word recognition score.
This is where a hearing care professional
either say or play more recorded words
at a comfortably audible level,
to see how accurately you can repeat those words.
Sometimes we will need to amplify the words
if you have a hearing loss.
This test evaluates your ability
not just to hear, but how well you understand speech.
These percentages are recorded
under the speech section of your audiogram.
If you have a hearing loss, it will provide
valuable insight into whether you'll
receive benefit from hearing aids.
There you go, those are the five evaluations
that we will use in order to test your hearing.
These components will provide a hearing care professional
with a foundational understanding of your hearing abilities.
It is possible that a hearing care professional
will decide to use additional tests
on top of these five core things,
in order to get more insight into
your hearing abilities as well.
This can include things like, speech and noise testing,
acoustic reflexes or tympanometry to see
how well your ear drums are moving
and to see if you have a healthy middle ear space.
While a hearing test may seem basic,
it's very important that the person testing your hearing,
has received proper training in order to perform the test
and to evaluate the results.
When it comes to hearing evaluations,
a doctor of audiology is the highest trained
hearing care professional in the field.
Alright, so if you haven't had a hearing test
in the last five years and really, who am I kidding?
You probably haven't had your hearing
tested since grade school.
It's about time that you go out
and you get that baseline hearing test.
After you get that baseline hearing test,
do yourself a favor and go in and get
a hearing evaluation every five years
if your hearing is normal and every year,
if you have a confirmed hearing loss.
That's it for this video, if you have any questions,
leave them in the comments section below.
If you like the video, go ahead and give it a thumbs up
and if you wanna see more videos just like this one,
go ahead and hit that subscribe button.
I'll see you next time.
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