A novel approach to initial hearing assessment

Objective: justifying the possibility of using frequency-based hearing research via the web application ‘Automated System for Initial Hearing Assessment’. Materials and methods. The study was carried out at the Department of Otorhinolaryngology of the Samara State Medical University clinics in October 2019. It involved 91 patients 17 to 73 years old (average age 48±14.6 years). All study participants were divided into two age groups: Group I 17-59 years old), and Group II (over 60 years old). Patients were required to undergo two hearing assessment tests: using the Interacoustics AC-40 clinical audiometer and using our web application ‘Automated System for Initial Hearing Assessment’ (patent No. 2019664671). Results. The maximum difference in average hearing thresholds between pure-tone threshold audiometry and the web application in Group I was 3.3 dB at a frequency of 2 kHz on the right and 3.2 dB at frequencies of 2 and 4 kHz on the left; in Group II, it constituted 4.7 and 3.5 dB at 1 and 2 kHz, on the right, correspondingly, and 7.2 dB at 4 kHz on the left. The presented data were evaluated using the Cohen’s kappa coefficient, which confirmed high level of agreement between the results obtained using the clinical audiometer vs. our original web application. Conclusion. Based on the obtained results, a conclusion was made about the possibility of using the original web application for the initial hearing express assessment in general practice in conditions of limited availability of audiological care.