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This study aimed to examine hearing-related information in public school textbooks in Malaysia to gain insight into the country's hearing health education.Qualitative content analysis on all textbooks used in Malaysian public schools in the year 2019 were conducted to identify the content and structure of information delivery through 11 years of formal education. Information related to hearing health was extracted and categorised according to the themes that emerged. Further analysis was done to characterise the usefulness of the information in promoting active hearing care based on the type of information delivered.A total of 148 elementary and secondary school textbooks were reviewed.Fourteen textbooks (4 elementary and 10 secondary levels) were found to have relevant hearing health information covering topics of sound, ear and hearing, noise and hearing loss. The contents were mostly theoretical and lacked information about noise-induced hearing loss and proper hearing care.Minimal hearing health information was present in the Malaysian school curriculum. The content was inadequate for teaching students about hearing loss prevention. Areas of improvement and research are recommended to improve school-based hearing health education in Malaysia.

The present study aimed to determine the test-retest reliability of subjective visual horizontal (SVH) testing when tested with solid and dotted line images. In this repeated measures study, 36 healthy young Malaysian adults (mean age=23.3±2.3 years, 17 males and 19 females) were enrolled. All of them were healthy and had no hearing, vestibular, balance, or vision problems. The SVH angles were recorded from each participant in an upright body position using a computerized device. They were asked to report their horizontality perception for solid and dotted line images (in the presence of a static black background). After 1 week, the SVH procedure was repeated. The test-retest reliability of SVH was found to be good for both solid line [intraclass correlation (ICC)=0.80] and dotted line (ICC=0.78). As revealed by Bland-Altman plots, for each visual image, the agreements of SVH between the two sessions were within the clinically accepted criteria (±2°). The SVH testing was found to be temporally reliable, which can be clinically beneficial. Both solid and dotted lines in the SVH testing are reliable to be used among young adults.

The vestibular evoked myogenic potentials (VEMPs) response characteristics depend on age, stimulus and individual anatomical differences. Therefore, normative data are required for accurate VEMPs interpretations. This cross-sectional study investigates VEMPs age-related changes among healthy adults using 750 Hz short alternating tone burst (TB) stimuli.Fifty adults aged between 23 years old and 76 years old with a mean of 51.56 (SD = 16.44) years old underwent air-conducted (AC) cervical VEMP (cVEMP) and head taps ocular VEMPs (oVEMPs) testing.The cVEMPs and oVEMPs response rates reduced significantly at the age of 50-year-old and above. No significant age trends were observed for both cVEMPs and oVEMPs latencies and asymmetry ratios. However, amplitude reduced with increasing age for both cVEMPs,To the best of our knowledge, this is the first published normative data for cVEMPs and oVEMPS in Malaysia and Southeast Asia, obtained among healthy adults aged between 23 years old and 76 years old. Health professionals in the region can use these findings as VEMPs normative references in their clinical settings.

Objectives: This study examined the quality of life (QoL) of the parents and siblings of hearing-impaired children with cochlear implants (CIs). Design: This is a cross-sectional, questionnaire-based study. The questionnaire consists of three sub-domains - interaction, emotional well-being and support for the hearing-impaired child and the overall QoL -- and two open-ended questions for participants to provide comments and suggestions to enhance their family's QoL. A total of 63 questionnaires were e-mailed or mailed to families who met the inclusion criteria. Setting: The study was conducted under the Center for Rehabilitation & Special Needs, Faculty of Health Sciences, Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia, Kuala Lumpur. Participants: A total of 79 parents and 23 siblings from 44 families of children with CI participated in this study. Main outcome measures: The mean score for each of the sub-domain and the overall QoL for both subject groups were computed. The answers for the open-ended questions were listed and organized into themes. Results: There were significant correlations between the overall QoL score and each of the test domains for the parents' group (p

The graviceptive otolith function can be measured using subjective visual horizontal (SVH) testing. Nevertheless, more research efforts are required to understand the essential variables affecting SVH.The aim of the present study was to determine the effects of type of visual image and gender on subjective visual horizontal (SVH) perception among healthy adults.In this comparative study, 50 healthy young adults were enrolled. While in an upright body position, they were required to report their perception of horizontality for two types of visual images (solid line and arrow pattern) using a computerized SVH device.The arrow pattern produced significantly bigger SVH angles than the solid line (The arrow pattern (a more complex visual image) produced bigger SVH deviations than the simple solid line image. In contrast, the horizontality perception does not appear to be affected by gender. The preliminary normative SVH data gathered from the present study can be beneficial for clinical and future research applications.

Early identification of any vestibular dysfunction and balance problem in children is crucial for their general well-being. However the identification process, could be challenging and difficult as compared to adults. We conducted a preliminary study to review our initial experience with ocular and cervical vestibular evoked myogenic potentials (oVEMPs and cVEMPs), video head impulse test (vHIT) and Bruininks Oseretsky Test of Motor Proficiency II (BOT-2) on healthy children and also to determine the feasibility of these tests in this population. Twenty one normal healthy children (12 boys and 9 girls), aged between 6 and 15 years old (mean age, 11.15 ± 2.54 years) participated in the study. They underwent oVEMPs and cVEMPs elicited with bone conduction stimulus via minishaker and air conduction stimulus respectively. All six semicircular canals were assessed using the vHIT. Bilateral coordination, balance, running, speed and agility which are the three subsets of BOT-2 gross motor assessment were conducted for balance assessment. All subjects completed the vestibular and balance assessment except for 1 subject who did not complete the vHIT vertical component. The response rate was 100% for oVEMPs, cVEMPs, and BOT-2, and 95.24% for vHIT. The mean latency and mean amplitude for n10 oVEMPs were 8.88 ± 0.92 and 2.71 ± 1.29, respectively. The mean latency for cVEMPs p13, and n23 were 13.4 ± 1.35 and 21.76 ± 3.71, respectively with interamplitude mean of 97.57 ± 42.69. The vHIT mean for vestibular ocular reflex (VOR) gain were >0.85 for lateral canals and > 0.65 for vertical canals. The mean scale score for bilateral coordination, balance, running, speed, and agility for BOT-2 were 17.52 ± 3.40, 15.14 ± 3.65 and 13.9 ± 5.46, respectively. This study suggest that VEMPs, vHIT, and BOT-2 are feasible test for vestibular and balance assessment in children. Apart from the tests findings, it is hoped that the described experienced and adjustment made in assessing this young population could also be applied by other relevant professionals. DOI : http://dx.doi.org./10.17576/JSKM-2017-1502-24

Objective Vestibular assessments in children are essential for the early identification of vestibular and balance dysfunctions. Vestibular evoked myogenic potentials, cervical (cVEMPs) and ocular (oVEMPs) have been reported to be feasible and effective when assessing otolith function in children. The main aim of the study was to obtain normative data for cVEMPs and oVEMPs from preschool and primary school-aged Malaysian children. Methods A group of 33 healthy children, aged from 5 years 9 months–12 years 4 months (mean ± SD = 8.83 ± 1.92 years), was recruited. Their otolith saccular function was assessed using 750 Hz tone burst for cVEMPs (with ER3A insert phone), while their utricular function was assessed using Bruel & Kjaer Mini-shaker Type 4810 (Naerum, Denmark) for oVEMPs. Results For cVEMPs, the mean value of P13 latency, N23 latency, P13–N23 interamplitude and asymmetry ratio were 12.62 ± 1.38 ms, 19.85 ± 1.95 ms, 92.47 ± 50.35 μV and 14.03 ± 9.75%, respectively. For oVEMPs, the mean value of N10 latency, P15 latency, N10–P15 interamplitude and asymmetry ratio were 9.23 ± 1.07 ms, 14.41 ± 1.04 ms, 10.32 ± 5.65 μV and 15.84 ± 11.49%, respectively. Two-way ANOVA analysis found that ear laterality and gender had no significant effect on all cVEMPs and oVEMPs parameters. No significant correlation was found between age and all VEMPs parameters. Conclusions The normative data for cVEMPs and oVEMPs obtained in this study can be used as a guide by health professionals to assess saccular and utricular functions among children age from 5 to 12 years of age.

Objective: This study was conducted to evaluate the speech perception of Malaysian Chinese adults using the Taiwanese Mandarin HINT (MHINT-T) and the Malay HINT (MyHINT). Design: The MHINT-T and the MyHINT were presented in quiet and noise (front, right and left) conditions under headphones. Results for the two tests were compared with each other and with the norms for each test. Study sample: Malaysian Chinese native speakers of Mandarin (N = 58), 18–31 years of age with normal hearing. Results: On average, subjects demonstrated poorer speech perception ability than the normative samples for these tests. Repeated measures ANOVA showed that speech reception thresholds (SRTs) were slightly poorer on the MHINT-T than on the MyHINT for all test conditions. However, normalized SRTs were poorer by 0.6 standard deviations for MyHINT as compared with MHINT-T. Conclusions: MyHINT and MHINT-T can be used as norm-referenced speech perception measures for Mandarin-speaking Chinese in Malaysia.

The aim of the study was to determine benefit to speech recognition in noise by adult cochlear implant users with the non-linear spectral subtraction (NSS) noise suppression strategy. Users of the Nucleus 22 or Nucleus 24 cochlear implant systems were tested with sentence materials combined with stationary noise at +5 and +10 dB signal to noise ratio (SNR), with and without NSS processing applied offline. Sentence scores were significantly higher with NSS processing, for both SNRs. The effect was greater at +5 dB SNR (12% improvement with NSS) than at +10 dB SNR (5% improvement with NSS). These results are promising and suggest that online implementation of NSS as part of cochlear implant processors has the potential to yield benefits for speech recognition in noise. Copyright © 2006 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Background and Objectives: This study investigated the effect of ageing on speech percep- tion in quiet and in noise, with noise directed from front, right and left. Subjects and Methods: Sixty Malay native adults with normal or near normal hearing comprising of 20 young adults (21 to 39 years old), 20 middle aged (40 to 59 years old) and 20 older adults (60 to 74 years old) participated in this study. Their speech perception ability was measured using the Malay Hear- ing in Noise Test (HINT) in four test conditions; 1) in quiet (HINT Q), 2) with noise from front (HINT NF), 3) with noise from right (HINT NR), and 4) with noise from left (HINT NL). Reception thresh- olds for sentences (RTSs) were measured in each of the aforementioned conditions using an adaptive method. Results: The results showed that, 1) genuine age-related decline was found in speech perception performance in HINT (NF), 2) hearing threshold was a major determinant differentiating speech perception performance for HINT (Q) and HINT (NL) conditions, and 3) speech perception performance for HINT (NR) was determined by both age and hearing thresh- old. Conclusions: This study suggests that, in older adults, while hearing thresholds affect speech perception in quiet, other factors such as central auditory processing and cognitive functions might be more important determinant factors for speech perception performance in noise. Korean J Audiol 2014;18(3):112-118

This is a preliminary attempt to investigate possible factors that may influence the academic performance in the clinical year students of Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia Audiology and Speech Sciences Programs. Thirty eight students (i.e. 92% of the overall clinical year students) volunteered as subjects. Their academic performance was based on their Cumulative Grade Point Average. Self-reported time management skills and perceived stress levels were evaluated using a set of questionnaires. The results highlighted that none of these factors have a significant effect on their CGPA. However, more in-depth study on larger target group should be carried out to determine other possible factors that may affect the students’ academic achievement.