Efficacy of cartilage conduction hearing aids in children

Objectives: Cartilage conduction hearing aids (CC-HAs) are novel hearing aids that use the third hearing pathway of cartilage conduction. We assessed the efficacy of CC-HAs and the hearing effects and safety of additional tape compression over the transducer in children with hearing loss. Methods: The patients (n = 42) underwent a one-month free trial of CC-HAs. Forty of them were patients with auditory canal atresia or stenosis. CC-HA-aided and unaided hearing thresholds (48 fitted ears) were determined using standard audiograms, after which participants could choose to purchase the device or not. We calculated the purchase rates and compared the patient characteristics between the purchase and non-purchase groups along with the purchase reason (or not). We applied additional tape compression over the CC-HA transducer and assessed the hearing effects and side effects. Results: CC-HA led to hearing improvements at all frequencies. Overall, 72.92% of participants purchased a CC-HA after the trial. By applying additional tape compression over the CC-HA transducer, the stability and hearing gains were improved mainly at low frequencies, and no side effects such as dermatitis were observed. Conclusions: CC-HAs are efficacious in producing hearing improvements in children, especially in patients with atresia or canal stenosis who cannot use air conduction hearing aids. Furthermore, we found that the additional tape compression over the transducer was an easy and a safe method for improving the hearing effects and stability of the CC-HA.