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NF2 Clinics
What is NF2?
Neurofibramatosis Type 2 (or NF2) is a rare genetic condition that leads to the growth of non-cancerous tumours on the linings of nerves. People with NF2 are very likely to have tumours affecting the nerve that carries information about their hearing and balance. This can cause problems with hearing and balance. Our NF2 clinic is a regional centre providing specialist assessment and management for individuals with NF2, working closely with doctors and other health professionals with a specialist experience of the condition.
Specialist Hearing Assessment and Rehabilitation Clinic (SHARC)
SHARC is a hearing assessment clinic which offers a specialist diagnostic and rehabilitation service for patients with complex hearing needs.
Specialist Assessments
As well as the routine hearing assessments, specialist assessments offered in SHARC include:
- Speech discrimination testing – Tests of your ability to hear and understand speech – scored by the number of words in a sentence or word list repeated correctly in quiet and in noise.
- Otoacoustic emission (OAE) test – Electronic measurement of a sound that is produced by your inner ear (cochlea), which bounces back out of your ear in response to a sound played – it is performed by placing a small soft tip that contains a microphone and speaker into your ear, sounds are generated in the soft tip and responses that come back from your cochlea are recorded. This gives us information about the health of your hearing organ.
- Threshold noise equalising (TEN) test – A test for the diagnosis of any ‘dead regions’ in your cochlea which are areas of you inner ear which have no hearing function.
- Evoked response audiometry (ERA) – Electronic hearing test – involves attaching sensors to your head to record electrical activity from your hearing nerve and other parts of your brain.
- Visible Speech Mapping – Measurement to check that your hearing aid is giving you the right amount of volume for different sounds and situations – it involves placing a very small soft tube into your ear and playing different sounds through a speaker while wearing your hearing aid.
Management
The service provides optimal hearing aids for complex hearing loss fitted using latest techniques to maximise the benefit from the hearing aids. You can also be referred through SHARC for hearing therapy, bone anchored hearing device (BAHA) assessment, cochlear implant assessment and middle ear implant assessment if necessary.
Additional needs Service
The service aims, where appropriate, to obtain an accurate assessment of hearing, manage ear wax and support hearing aid use. This may involve testing how well speech and speech sounds are heard before and after hearing aids are fitted. Wax removal can be organised if needed and we can refer to social services for assistive listening devices, for example devices that help with hearing the smoke alarm, the doorbell, the phone or the TV.
What to expect when you visit Audiology?
What to expect when you visit Audiology?
When you visit the hospital you will visit several departments, which will include genetics, ENT and Audiology. When you arrive at the Audiology department, the audiologist will look at your ears and may do several hearing assessments. These could involve measuring the quietest levels of sound you can hear and asking you to repeat back words heard through headphones. This will provide the doctors with information about your hearing and enable them to decide with you what the best management options are. We may also make recommendations about hearing aids if they are suitable for you.
