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Hearing Impairment and Hearing Disability – Towards a Paradigm Change in Hearing Services

I offered to review this book hoping to gain some helpful and insightful tips for an assignment that I have been working on. The title implies that the book will give practical tips and strategies for helping to deliver service...

Commercial desiccants or uncooked rice?

Moisture can damage any electronic devices including hearing aids. It is commonly known that rice can ‘rescue’ an electronic device if wetted. Authors of the below-described study researched whether uncooked rice could be used as an efficient equivalent to often...

Nasal nitric oxide – an inflammatory marker in paediatric allergic rhinitis?

Nasal nitric oxide (nNO) is mainly produced in the paranasal sinus mucosa and was shown in some studies to have increased expression in allergic rhinitis (AR). Although it represents a potential non-invasive tool for AR measurement, there remains no consensus...

Remembering the first word first or the last word first: what does this mean about the interaction between language and short term memory?

This article reviews theories of how verbal short term memory (STM) interacts with other language functions and thus how semantics or phonology of target items can influence what individuals remember. The authors describe examples from the research literature that have...

Imagine a future without hearing loss

This article reflects on both the past 20 years and the next 20 years of research and service provision for children who are deaf or hard of hearing. The authors describe how universal newborn hearing screens have had a dramatic...

Myringoplasty in a bottle?

Management of large traumatic TM perforations can involve observation and water precautions or surgical repair. Closure rates for larger perforations can be 8-12 weeks and occurs for between 38-79%. Animal and human studies have shown that exogenous application of epidermal...

Measuring is understanding: an unsupervised PROM clustering of CRS patients

It has been clear for quite some years, at least for anyone dealing daily with chronic rhinosinusitis (CRS) patients, that CRS is an ‘umbrella’ diagnosis. There are significant differences between patients, including different demographic data, different endoscopic and radiographic images,...

Hearing loss and QOL

This article evaluates the impact of hearing loss and its rehabilitation on the quality of life (QoL) of adults. The authors suggest that the currently used scale, Aphab, is long, complicated and does not take into account minor changes. The...

Measuring the ‘impact’ of preoperative immunonutrition

Using preoperative nutritional supplements as part of ‘enhanced recovery’ in surgical patients is not a new concept. This interesting paper looks at the latest development in optimising patients undergoing head and neck oncological surgery. Immunonutrition (Nestle’s ‘Oral Impact’ in this...

Facial pain and headaches

This paper reviews the present knowledge and the recent publications on the cause, characteristics, course and treatment of chronic and recurring facial pain and headaches. Facial pain should be defined in terms of frequency, duration and severity, and also in...

Choosing our tools: assessing language in dementia

Language led dementia, also known as primary progressive aphasia (PPA), is an emerging area of practice in speech and language therapy. Given that the diagnosis centres around the key diagnostic feature of language, whereby language impairment is the most prominent...