A news that will delight hearing impaired whose audiogram (test that measures hearing capacity) is correct and which therefore have no prosthetic support. It is possible to follow a conversation in a noisy environment because our brain focuses on the frequency of the voice to eliminate the noise around. But some people still find it difficult to understand speech.
And it is indeed a pathology that causes this handicap. “We observed, thanks to the study of a mutant mouse with certain auditory sensory cells affected, that this model was transposable to humans” explains Christine Petit, professor at the Collège de France and director of the genetics and physiology of hearing at the Institut Pasteur.
Differentiate frequencies
In question ? Hearing frequencies. It is the audiogram that measures the auditory thresholds for the perception of sounds of different frequencies. “When a sound arrives in the cochlea, the organ of hearing, the different frequencies that compose it will be broken down, coded, then transmitted by nerve pathways to the brain which will interpret the sound” specifies Dr Aziz El Amraoui, research director of the Institut Pasteur.
In the case of the pathology identified by the researchers, it is the differentiation of sounds of close frequencies that is affected. In other words, the problem arises when the ear has to code high-pitched sounds in an environment of low-pitched sounds.
To highlight this anomaly, “it suffices to complete the classic audiogram by a finer measurement with an acoustic otoemission device”, notes Prof. Avan, head of the neurosensory biophysics team at the Faculty of Medicine of Clermont. -Ferrand.
Thanks to this discovery, the hearing care professionals will be able to respond more precisely and relieve the ailments of certain hearing impaired people, by adapting the hearing aid.
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