What we do with what we hear is called
auditory processing. Auditory processing disorder is a term used for a list of
disorders that affect the way the brain understands and processes information
received through the ear. Most people with this disorder possess a normal
structure of the inner, middle and outer ear. They also function normally. The
processing of information is where they lag. These patients find it difficult
to recognize sounds as well as interpret them. Most of the sounds are those
which consist of speech. Many theories are floating around regarding this
disease and the most dominant one suggests that this could be because of a
dysfunction in the brain. This disorder affects adults as well as children. It has
also been believed that males are more prone to this disorder than females.
However, there are no substantial studies done to corroborate this fact.
Causes: -
- This disorder can be acquired or developed over a period of time. It is not necessary for one to be aware of this disorder initially. But it may be identified over a period of time. Some of the main causes of this disorder could be head injuries, ear infections or delay in development of the nervous system. These may affect processing of auditory information in the brain. Some children are found to have difficulty in comprehending language.
- Diagnosis reveals that peripheral hearing is normal. At times, the child is thought to be deaf. This is a case of regressive development. Sometimes one may be prone to seizures. This affects the left temporal lobe, leading to problems with auditory processing.
Diagnosis: -
- This disorder is difficult to diagnose and detect soon. The symptoms leading to evaluation of this disorder include inability to process audible information. The affected person may also have problems with decoding of speech in environments which are noisy. The affected person then tries to guess and fill the gaps.
- However, children with the above symptoms show no evidence of any neurological disease and the study is made due to performance of behavioral auditory tests. Here, there is no coordination between what one hears at the periphery and their ability to decode those sounds.
- Diagnostic benchmarks for children with these disorders were widely disputed. Many often said that a child may fare poorly in an auditory test because of his inattentiveness, limit in understanding the language or difficulty in coping with the demand of the task. To cope with this, it was ultimately ruled that the child must have a modality problem specifically. This could help in diagnosing the child has OPD.
Characteristics: -
- The disease could manifest into the patient believing that someone is speaking nonsense to him. This is largely because the brain is unable to process the information heard and therefore causing one to hear confusing words that cannot be understood.
Training: -
- There is a shortage of well-planned evaluations of clinical intervention with mixed and controlled trial methods. Largely, for such evidence to work, it has to adopt lesser standards of evidence, like showing that the patient improves after training. Influences include maturation, practice or placebo effects.
- Some research has indicated that training with some auditory processing tasks improve performance on certain auditory processing measures. Physiological level changes have also been recorded after such training. An uncontrolled study also mentioned successful results for children with this disorder using the auditory training software.
- Treating more issues related to such disorders can result in further success. The treatment of speech difficulties can result in curing of both the speech difficulty as well as auditory processing.
All of the points mentioned above clearly
indicate that the auditory processing disorder is a curable disease, but it
should be cured in the nascent stage itself. This is more beneficial to both,
the patient as well as the doctor. Moreover, if you want to get more useful
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