PURPOSE: to verify the benefit of an individual sound amplification device in the elderly people from Porto Velho, Rondônia and surrounding area, also comparing the results to the degree of hearing loss installed in this population. METHOD: 18 elderly people aged from 60 to 82 years old were part of this study. They suffer from mild to moderately severe sensorineural hearing loss. The benefit was evaluated by the Abbreviated Profile of Hearing Aid Benefit - APHAB questionnaire under conditions of with and without hearing aids which was applied at the moment of adaptation and three months later. For analysis of the responses were considered the following subscales: Ease of communication, environmental noise, reverberant noise and sound aversion. The provided benefit was evaluated according to the degree of hearing loss by each subject. RESULTS: it was verified benefit in the subscales: ease of communication, environmental noise and reverberant noise, and these results demonstrated a statistically significant difference. With regard to the relation between the benefit to the degree of loss, it was found, among subjects with symmetrical hearing loss, greater benefit in those ones with sensorineural moderate hearing loss. However, it was not possible to verify the relation between the degree of loss and the provided benefit among individuals with different degrees of hearing loss. CONCLUSION: there was a reduction of hearing difficulties through the use of sound amplification in favorable environments, as well as in reverberant and high noise level ones.
Presbycusis; Hearing Aids; Questionnaires; Elderly People; Adaptation
