Effect of cochlear implantation on subjective listening effort in patients with single-sided deafness (SSD)

Introduction Cochlear implantation (CI) is an established therapy for cochlear single-sided deafness (SSD). Previous studies have mainly focused on demonstrating the benefit of a CI on speech understanding in noise and on directional hearing. The aim of the study was to investigate the extent to which a CI reduces the subjectively perceived listening effort in SSD patients.

Material and method Monocentric study with 48 patients (age: 51±12.6 years) who were fitted with a CI due to acquired SSD. In addition to speech intelligibility in noise using the Oldenburg sentence test (OLSA) and directional hearing by determining the root mean square (RMS) error, subjective listening effort was evaluated using the Int. 3.0 listening effort questionnaire (without and with CI).

Results When using the CI, there was a significant improvement in speech understanding in noise for SssdNnh (p<0.001), but not for S0N0 and S0Nssd. The RMS error was also significantly lower with CI (p<0.01). Regardless of age, there was a significant reduction in listening effort in 16 out of 17 of the listening situations surveyed (p≤0.016). The only exception was the situation when listening to music in quiet rooms (p=0.73). The extent of the audiometrically proven improvement in speech comprehension in the SssdNnh test arrangement (δ-/+CI) and in localization ability (δ-/+CI) correlated with the extent of the reduction in listening effort (p=0.041 and p<0.001).

Conclusion Cochlear implantation can significantly improve subjective hearing effort. This correlates with the objectively verifiable improvement in speech intelligibility in noise and with directional hearing.

Publication History

Article published online:
19 April 2024