A Look Into The Features Of An Audiometer

By Tiffany Gill


An audiometer is a medical device found in most clinics, hospitals and audiology centers. Its use is to determine the hearing loss intensity of patients. Generally, the device can be used by E. N. T specialist in diagnosing various problems. The standard measurement unit for this device is the decibel. It is a unit which is universally accepted to measure the intensity of sound.

The device resembles a pair of headphones but is fitted with a feedback button which is controlled by a computer. The computer helps the specialist conducting the hearing loss analysis to display the data which is eventually used to form an audiogram. This audiogram is the one used to analyze the range through which a patient can react to given sound frequency.

The audiogram is plotted with the intensity of sound as the y axis in decibel units and the frequency of sound in the x- axis in hertz. The measured reading of the patient will be noted down and used to plot such a graph. Usually, the specialist uses computer software to aid them in drawing a perfect graph. They feed the reading to the computer software which automatically plots the audiogram graph. An important frequency known as the fundamental is included in the data as it is being fed to software to ensure the resulting audiogram captures all the details of the patient.

If you decide to shop for an audiometer, you will either go for the software or the hardware type. The software type is most common in homes and educational institutions. It uses special developed software which is installed in a computer. Data fed into this software gives the hearing range of the patient under test.

Hardware devices on the other contain an embedded unit which is connected next to the headphones. This unit is linked with a special button which gives feedback signal to the device during operation. This device is relatively expensive than the software type as it gives results of higher accuracy. They are very efficient in hearing loss tests.

The overall procedure of identifying a hearing loss problem is not complex as you might think. With this device, it is very easy.it only entails the patient being subjected to an audio from the device then their reaction at different frequencies being noted. These different frequencies give a range of the hearing capabilities of the patient. The range aid the medical specialist in treating such a patient.

During hearing loss analysis, the way through which patients respond to the sound varies. Adult patients are required to press a button while small children are provided with toys to show their reactions to the sound. Head turn can also be used to note a reaction to the sound.

An audiometer can also be used to diagnosis hearing problems in animals. Veterinary doctors do train the animals to react to these sound frequencies through different ways. They can train the animals to eat, raise special sound or behave anomaly whenever they hear such audio.




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