Impact of Hearing Aid use on listening skill of hearing impaired Students

Background: Hearing loss affects listening and communication. Listening represents the basis for verbal communication. Literature reveals a research gap as regards listening effort in case of HA users. Hence, current study was conceived to determine the impact of hearing aid on listening skills of school going hearing impaired students. Methods: This comparative study was conducted from 1st February, 2023 to 30th June, 2023 at Shifa International Hospital Ltd using purposive sampling. Sample of N=66 participant students of both genders, aged 5 years and above with moderate to profound hearing loss for more than three years and using hearing aids. 20 words were presented to the participant first without hearing aids and then with hearing aids and their response was recorded. Data analysis was performed by SPSS version-23 & Wilcoxon signed rank test was used to determine any associations and p<0.05 was considered significant.  Results:  Results revealed that for unaided condition Median (IQR) score of 54, and IQR of 35. & mean rank 32.  In aided condition Median (IQR) score was 80, IQR was 2 &. mean rank was 0. The p=0.000 suggests a significant difference between the two categories. Conclusion: Study concludes that there is substantial improvement in the listening skills of participants with hearing aids on as compared to without hearing aid with children having moderately severe category of hearing loss benefitting the most from hearing aids.