In the past decade, several auditory research laboratories have utilized the Portable Automated Rapid Testing (PART) application to evaluate tests of auditory processing ability outside the traditional laboratory setting. Atest battery of spectral, temporal, spectrotemporal, binaural processing, and spatial release from masking have previously been evaluated on normal hearing listeners and those with mild-to-moderate amounts of sensorineural hearing loss. In theory, subtests from PART could help audiologists better treat patients with similar amounts of hearing loss presenting with differing auditory complaints, in comparison to pure tone and speech-in-quiet tests. Here, we compare previous results to pilot data from bilateral cochlear implant patients tested in lab and at-home environments. Data were collected with an iPad with stimuli presented through circumaural headphones. Headphones were placed on top of the ear-level processors of cochlear implants. Feasibility of testing bilateral cochlear implant patients, test–retest thresholds for different test environments, and comparisons to normal hearing and mild-to-moderate amounts of sensorineural hearing losses will be discussed. With time constraints in clinics, the ability to evaluate additional measures at home could be a viable solution to assist clinical decisions such as auditory training tasks or guidance in fitting.
Diedesch et al. (Wed,) studied this question.