What is meant by Audiology

Audiology (from Latin audÄ«re, "to hear"; and from Greek -λογία, -logia) is a branch of science that studies hearing, balance, and related disorders.^[1] Audiologists treat those with hearing loss and proactively prevent related damage. By employing various testing strategies (e.g. behavioral hearing tests, otoacoustic emission measurements, and electrophysiologic tests), audiologists aim to determine whether someone has normal sensitivity to sounds. If hearing loss is identified, audiologists determine which portions of hearing (high, middle, or low frequencies) are affected, to what degree (severity of loss), and where the lesion causing the hearing loss is found (outer ear, middle ear, inner ear, auditory nerve and/or central nervous system). If an audiologist determines that a hearing loss or vestibular abnormality is present he or she will provide recommendations for interventions or rehabilitation (e.g. hearing aids, cochlear implants, appropriate medical referrals).

In addition to diagnosing audiologic and vestibular pathologies, audiologists can also specialize in rehabilitation of tinnitus, hyperacusis, misophonia, auditory processing disorders, cochlear implant use and/or hearing aid use. Audiologists can provide hearing health care from birth to end-of-life.

An audiologist is a health-care professional specializing in identifying, diagnosing, treating, and monitoring disorders of the auditory and vestibular systems. Audiologists are trained to diagnose, manage and/or treat hearing, tinnitus, or balance problems. They dispense, manage, and rehabilitate hearing aids and assess candidacy for and map cochlear implants. They counsel families through a new diagnosis of hearing loss in infants, and help teach coping and compensation skills to late-deafened adults. They also help design and implement personal and industrial hearing safety programs, newborn hearing screening programs,[2] school hearing screening programs, and provide special or custom fitted ear plugs and other hearing protection devices to help prevent hearing loss. Audiologists are trained to evaluate peripheral vestibular disorders originating from pathologies of the vestibular portion of the inner ear. They also provide treatment for certain vestibular and balance disorders such as Benign Paroxysmal Positional Vertigo (BPPV). In addition, many audiologists work as auditory or acoustic scientists in a research capacity.

Audiologists are trained in anatomy and physiology, hearing aids, cochlear implants, electrophysiology, acoustics, psychophysics and psychoacoustics, neurology, vestibular function and assessment, balance disorders, counseling and communication options such as sign language. Audiologists may also run a neonatal hearing screening program which has been made compulsory in many hospitals in US, UK and India. An audiologist usually graduates with one of the following qualifications: BSc, MSc(Audiology), Au.D., STI, PhD, or ScD, depending the program and country attended.

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Lisa M

Journal manager

Journal of phonetics and audiology

E-mail: jpay@scholarlypub.com