Outside of major metropolitan areas, Arizona has limited options for hearing healthcare. The Arizona Affordable Hearing Aid Task Force proposed the development of a statewide program to provide low-cost hearing aids and audiologic care to low-income residents. The purpose of this review was to determine the status of the literature on the clinical outcomes of teleaudiology services for evaluations and hearing aid fittings which could be used to serve inhabitants of rural counties and address the goals of the Task Force. A literature search was performed to identify articles with original research in teleaudiology in the areas of evaluation and treatment and yielded 234 results. After exclusion criteria were applied, there were 15 articles for review; 10 articles focused on audiological evaluation and 5 articles focused on verification, validation, and counseling for hearing aid fittings. Evaluation-related articles showed that pure-tone air conduction testing was generally within the ± 5 dB acceptable range of variability, with little evidence on bone conduction or speech testing reliability. Studies reporting real-ear measurements with probe microphones were shown to yield similar results in traditional and teleaudiology fitting sessions and validation measures documented similar or better outcomes from teleaudiology fittings. Based on the literature, it is concluded that the use of teleaudiology is feasible for hearing aid fittings and counseling in rural areas, if associated barriers related to costs and limitations related to the availability of technology are overcome.

Introduction: Disabling hearing loss is one of the most common sensory deficits; affecting approximately 466 million people worldwide. In the South African context, public health facilities have an uneven ratio between audiologists and patients in need and thus audiological services are often minimal. Successful application of tele-health may increase the scope of audiological services for hearing aid (HA) users. Research is needed to investigate feasibility of tele-health for audiological rehabilitation programmes such as auditory training (AT). Aim and Objectives: This study aimed to investigate the feasibility of implementing a telerehabilitation programme in a South African public health context. Objectives included: 1) determining online AT compliance; 2) determining the effect of online AT on speech perception in noise; 3) assessing experience and benefit of tele-rehabilitation through questionnaires and interviewing; and 4) cost estimation around tele-rehabilitation implementation. Research Design: A convergent mixed methods design with a feasibility approach was utilized. Data collection was through questionnaires, in-booth speech assessments, online AT and face-to-face interviewing. Participants undertook online AT over four weeks. Pre-/post- online AT: the APHAB, QuickSIN, Entrance/Exit Questionnaires, Interviews and System Usability Scale were administered. Descriptive statistics were used to analyse the quantitative data collected, and descriptive thematic analysis was used for the qualitative data. Study sample: Purposive sampling was used and three female adult (35 - 55 years) HA users from a public health facility participated. Results: 1) High compliance rate (84.82%) with 3 hours 25 minutes total clinician contact time, 2) clinical benefit with improvement in listening skills and perceived HA benefit, 3) positive participant feedback, and 4) estimated cost at R1350.00 per person. Conclusions: Findings from this feasibility study can be seen as positive indicators towards the use of tele-health as a delivery modality for audiological rehabilitation, also a tele-health hybrid model is recommended. However, larger-scaled research is needed.