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Head and neck cancer multidisciplinary team

Why do we have MDTs? Do they make a difference to outcomes? Jon Bernstein explores the whys and wherefores of the head and neck cancer MDT, and wonders where things might go from here… Head and neck (upper aerodigestive tract)...

The multidisciplinary voice clinic

In his inimitable way, Nick Gibbins tells us why the voice clinic is the highlight of his week – and his very own field of dreams. The voice clinic has come a long way in the last 40 years. The...

Are we making progress on tinnitus?

One of the aspects of tinnitus that drew me into it becoming a major theme of my clinical and research work was how little work had been done when I began to see patients in the mid 1980s. This struck...

Leading and managing audiology service through a social enterprise model

As these things sometimes happen, our first conversations about Social Enterprise happened pretty much by chance and in our case were a by-product of discussions about a new department having outgrown the current one. The National Health Service (NHS) Audiology...

Benchmarking for innovation in healthcare ­– an approach from 
Down Under and a gap in the 
National Health Service?

Benchmarking is a process of comparison between the performance characteristics of separate, often competing, organisations intended to enable each participant to improve its own performance [1]. Often, in healthcare, benchmarking is carried out by central government departments or regional agencies...

The changing role of audiology

Audiology has changed dramatically in recent years. Cochlear implants and high power hearing aids have made hearing really available to children with essentially any degree of hearing loss. Those of us who have been in the field for a long...

Wireless accessories for hearing aid users: putting the ‘soul’ back into hearing – a case study

The following case study reports on the experiences of a hearing impaired National Health Service (NHS) patient who was given Bluetooth accessories as part of a study into their benefits when used with hearing aids [1]. The name of the...

Help shape the future of mild to moderate hearing loss research

A James Lind Alliance Priority Setting Partnership has been formed to help shape the future of research into mild-moderate hearing loss. Who is the Priority Setting Partnership? The Partnership brings together Hearing Link, Action on Hearing Loss, the British Society...

Neuroimaging WG3. Neuroimaging as a window on the heterogeneity of tinnitus

Pim van Dijk and Sven Vanneste describe the hope that brain imaging techniques used for research will provide a better understanding of the heterogeneity of tinnitus through large-scale analysis. Their project will create a procedure whereby researchers can submit their...

Genetics WG4. Improving diagnosis and drug development through the genetic understanding of tinnitus subtypes: a TINNET endeavour

Christopher R Cederroth and Jose Antonio Lopez-Escamez explain how progress is being made to investigate the contribution of genetic factors to tinnitus, including a subtype of ‘extreme’ tinnitus in Ménière’s disease. Genetics WG4 is working towards determining the genetic basis...

Multidisciplinary approach to managing individuals with trisomy 21

Michelle Chung and Narad Mathura outline the Down syndrome one-stop clinic; a multidisciplinary clinic introduced at the Children & Young Persons Audiology Centre (CYPAC) at Guys and St Thomas’ NHS Foundation Trust for children and young people with Down syndrome....

2020 Lancet Commission on dementia: a call to action for integrated hearing healthcare

Dr Georgiou’s summary of the 2020 update to the 2017 Lancet Commission underscores the importance of medical and hearing healthcare professionals working together to tackle the modifiable risk factors that affect individuals throughout their lives, to help delay or even...