The Use of Illustrations as an Adjunct to Administration of the COSI with Aging Patients

ABSTRACT

The major goal of hearing aid dispensing is to reduce the perceived handicap resulting from hearing loss. To date, many self-assessment techniques have been designed to quantify the emotional and social effects of self-perceived hearing impairment in the noninstitutionalized elderly. A formalized procedure, the Client Oriented Scale of Improvement (COSI), has been used to document goals and needs and to measure improvements in the hearing ability of adult clients. The major advantage of this procedure is that there is greater focus on the client's individual needs when designing his or her rehabilitation program. Memory problems are one of the common complaints of the elderly. Over the years, research has shown that older individuals have particular difficulty with episodic memory, the conscious recollection of particular episodes or events that have occurred in a person's experience. This is supported by the finding that memory performance of older people is most affected when memory is tested using free recall of studied items, with smaller age-related reductions when memory is tested using recognition paradigms. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the efficacy of using pictures with the COSI to assist elderly subjects with hearing loss in recalling and identifying difficult listening situations in need of improvement with amplification. The study examined the responses of 30 older subjects ranging in age from 65 to 85 years who were all new hearing aid users.

KEYWORDS

Aural rehabilitation - COSI - hearing aids

REFERENCES

• 1 Brock J N. The Aging of America: The Evolution of the Aging Population. Available at: http://www.cba.gsu.edu/magazine/aging.html Accessed March 28, 2005
• 2 National Institute on Deafness and Other Communication Disorders (NIDCD) .NIH Senior Health: Hearing Loss-Hearing Loss Defined. Washington, DC; NIDCD September, 2004
• 3 Weinstein B E, Ventry I M. Audiometric correlates of the Hearing Handicap Inventory for the elderly.  J Speech Hear Disord. 1983;  48 379-384
• 4 Tulving E. Elements of Episodic Memory. New York; Oxford University Press 1983
• 5 Burke D M, Light L L. Memory and aging: the role of retrieval processes.  Psychol Bull.. 1981;  90 513-514
• 6 Rabinowitz J C. Aging and recognition failure.  J Gerontol. 1984;  39 65-71
• 7 Craik F IM, McDowd J M. Age differences in recall and recognition.  J Exp Psychol Learn Mem Cogn. 1987;  13 474-479
• 8 Parkin A J, Walter B M. Recollective experience, normal aging, and frontal dysfunction.  Psychol Aging. 1992;  7 290-298
• 9 Jennings J M, Jacoby L L. An opposition procedure for detecting age-related deficits in recollection: telling effects of repetition.  Psychol Aging. 1997;  12 352-361
• 10 Park D C, Puglisi J T, Sovacool M. Memory for pictures, and spatial location in older adults: evidence for pictorial superiority.  J Gerontol. 1983;  38 582-588
• 11 Paivio A. Imagery and Verbal Processes. New York; Holt, Rinehart & Winston 1971
• 12 Paivio A, Rogers T B, Smythe P C. Why are pictures easier to recall than words?.  Psychon Sci. 1968;  11 137-138
• 13 Morrel R W, Park D C, Poon L W. Effects of labeling techniques on memory and comprehension of prescription information in young and old adults.  J Gerontol. 1990;  45 P166-P172
• 14 Dillon H. Hearing Aids. New York; Thieme 2001
• 15 Dillon H, James A M, Ginis I. Client Oriented Scale of Improvement (COSI) and its relationship to several other measures of benefit and satisfaction provided by hearing aids.  J Am Acad Audiol. 1997;  8 27-43
• 16 Montgomery A, Houston W. Management of the hearing-impaired adult. In: Alpiner J, McCarthy P Rehabilitative Audiology: Children and Adults. 3rd ed. Baltimore, MD; Lippincott Williams & Wilkins 2000
• 17 Bate H. Aural rehabilitation of the older adult.  Self-Help for the Hard of Hearing Journal. 1986; May/June; 
• 18 Folstein M F, Folstein S E, McHugh P R. Mini-Mental State: a practical method for grading the state of patients for the clinician.  J Psychiatr Res. 1975;  12 189-198