Audiology features
Thyroid dysfunction and Meniere’s disease: is there a relationship?
The set of symptoms described as Meniere’s disease may have several causative factors. Timothy Hain and Patthida Maroongroge look for a relationship in the literature between Meniere’s disease and hypothyroidism. Meniere’s disease (MD) affects around two in 1000 people and...
Congenital CMV: investigations and management in the audiology setting
Congenital cytomegalovirus (cCMV) is the only cause of congenital sensorineural hearing loss (SNHL) for which there is a medical treatment available to prevent further hearing loss. Dr Simone Walter discusses cCMV infection, cCMV-related hearing loss, and how to facilitate their...
Drug side-effects on audiological and vestibular testing
Are they a malingerer? Or perhaps they are inattentive? It may be their drugs! Robert DiSogra considers the side-effects of medication on the test subject. The audiogram serves many purposes in clinical practice. For the audiologist, it helps to differentiate...
The effects of polypharmacy in the elderly
Another pill to cure the ill? Alec Lapira discusses the warning signs of polypharmacy in the elderly population. Polypharmacy in the elderly Polypharmacy – defined as the use of five or more medications – occurs in 20–37% of older people...
Dizziness: confusion, issues and considerations
Douglas L Beck gives his unique take on the difficulties involved in diagnosing dizzy patients and the importance of well-founded research acting as the basis for any diagnosis and treatment decisions. Dizziness. Uh-oh. We really have a very limited understanding...
Paediatric vestibular evaluation
Richard E Gans is a renowned expert in the areas of vestibular evaluation and rehabilitation techniques. In the first of two articles (see here for the second article), Dr Gans gives an overview of the approach he and his team...
Rotational chair testing: “To rotate, or not to rotate, that is the real question”
Passive whole body rotation tests are widely considered to be the ‘gold standard’ for the identification of bilateral peripheral vestibular disorders (bPVD), but also have a part to play in identifying unilateral disorders (uPVD). In this article Paul Radomskij discusses...
Clinical utility and practical interpretation of the video head impulse test
The head impulse test (HIT) is an essential bedside test to detect peripheral vestibular deficits. The video head impulse test (vHIT) is a new tool quantifying the HIT. In this article Maria Heuberger and colleagues point out the clinical utility...
Using psychological behaviour change theory in vestibular practice
Fiona Barker explains the importance of recognising and understanding how habitual behaviours in vestibular patients can affect treatment outcomes, and how we as audiologists can support and encourage patients to modify these behaviours and perhaps address our own professional behaviours...
Vestibular rehabilitation therapy: diagnosis based strategies
In his second article on this topic (see here for the first article), Richard E Gans explains how to use vestibular rehabilitation therapy to treat vestibular patients, and demonstrates why this method of diagnosis based strategies has proved so successful....
Assessing dizziness-related quality of life in the paediatric population
In this article, Devin McCaslin and Gary Jacobson share their experience of assessing dizziness-related quality of life in paediatric patients, and demonstrate that the involvement of care-givers is vital in ensuring the most appropriate assessment and treatment for this particular...
Cytomegalovirus (CMV) and the vestibular system: a case study
This team of audiologists from Cincinnati Children’s Hospital Medical Centre discuss an eight year old with congenital CMV, a neonatal infection which is usually asymptomatic, and provide guidance on how to recognise the signs in the paediatric population, and screen...
