[Audiological effect of bone-anchored hearing aid].

The bone-anchored hearing aid (BAHA) has proved to be a valuable alternative to conventional air and bone conduction hearing aids for patients suffering from chronic otitis media or bilateral aural atresia. The BAHA gave better sound quality and greater comfort than conventional hearing aids (HAs), but only 1 study has been done in Japan. We implanted BAHAs in 6 hard-of-hearing patients in the last 2 years. One patient suffered skin problems around the abutment and used the BAHA only briefly. Free-field audiometry, the speech discrimination test (SDT), and the speech recognition test (SRT) were conducted in all subjects. They were evaluated either with the HA or BAHA. The SDT and SRT showed better hearing results in quiet for the BAHA than the conventional HA, but there was a minimum difference in SDT and SRT in noise. Subjects assessed the HA and BAHA using questionnaires. Subjects reported that the BAHA offers a number of important advantages, including greater cosmetic acceptability, improved speech intelligibility, and better sound quality.