Unilateral versus bilateral hearing aids for bilateral hearing impairment in adults
Appendices
Appendix 1. Draft search strategies
| MEDLINE (Ovid) | Embase (Ovid) | CENTRAL |
| 1 exp Hearing Loss/ 2 (hearing adj2 (loss* or impair* or partial* or deficit* or deteriorat* or degenerat* or diminish* or difficult* or disabilit* or hard or one side* or unilateral)).ti,ab. 3 deaf*.ti,ab. 4 (hypoacus* or presbycus* or presbyacus* or sociocus* or nosocus* or anacus*).ti,ab. 5 Persons With Hearing Impairments/ 6 or/1‐5 7 letter/ 8 editorial/ 9 news/ 10 exp historical article/ 11 Anecdotes as Topic/ 12 comment/ 13 case report/ 14 (letter or comment*).ti. 15 or/7‐14 16 randomized controlled trial/ or random*.ti,ab. 17 15 not 16 18 animals/ not humans/ 19 Animals, Laboratory/ 20 exp animal experiment/ 21 exp animal model/ 22 exp Rodentia/ 23 (rat or rats or mouse or mice).ti. 24 or/17‐23 25 6 not 24 26 Hearing Aids/ 27 "Correction of Hearing Impairment"/is [Instrumentation] 28 (hearing adj (aid* or instrument*)).ti,ab. 29 (ear mold* or earmold* or ear mould* or earmould* or amplif*).ti,ab. 30 or/26‐29 31 (contralateral or bilateral* or binaural or unilateral* or monoaural or (bi adj3 lateral*) or (uni adj3 lateral*) or bimodal).ti,ab. 32 ((both or two or one or left or right or single or double) adj3 (side* or ear or ears or fitting*)).ti,ab. 33 31 or 32 34 30 and 33 35 ((both or two or one or left or right or single or double) adj3 (aid* or instrument*)).ti,ab. 36 34 or 35 37 25 and 36 38 randomized controlled trial.pt. 39 controlled clinical trial.pt. 40 randomi#ed.ti,ab. 41 placebo.ab. 42 randomly.ti,ab. 43 Clinical Trials as topic.sh. 44 trial.ti 45 or/38‐44 46 37 and 45 | 1 exp *hearing impairment/ 2 (hearing adj2 (loss* or impair* or partial* or deficit* or deteriorat* or degenerat* or diminish* or difficult* or disabilit* or hard or one side* or unilateral)).ti,ab. 3 deaf*.ti,ab. 4 (hypoacus* or presbycus* or presbyacus* or sociocus* or nosocus* or anacus*).ti,ab. 5 or/1‐4 6 letter.pt. or letter/ 7 note.pt. 8 editorial.pt 9 case report/ or case study/ 10 (letter or comment*).ti. 11 or/6‐10 12 randomized controlled trial/ or random*.ti,ab. 13 11 not 12 14 animals/ not humans/ 15 nonhuman/ 16 exp animal experiment/ 17 exp Experimental Animal/ 18 animal model/ 19 exp Rodent/ 20 (rat or rats or mouse or mice).ti. 21 or/13‐20 22 5 not 21 23 Hearing Aid/ 24 (hearing adj (aid* or instrument*)).ti,ab. 25 (ear mold* or earmold* or ear mould* or earmould* or amplif*).ti,ab. 26 or/23‐25 27 (contralateral or bilateral* or binaural or unilateral* or monoaural or (bi adj3 lateral*) or (uni adj3 lateral*) or bimodal).ti,ab. 28 ((both or two or one or left or right or single or double) adj3 (side* or ear or ears or fitting*)).ti,ab. 29 27 or 28 30 26 and 29 31 ((both or two or one or left or right or single or double) adj3 (aid* or instrument*)).ti,ab. 32 30 or 31 33 22 and 32 34 random*.ti,ab. 35 factorial*.ti,ab. 36 (crossover* or cross over*).ti,ab. 37 ((doubl* or singl*) adj blind*).ti,ab. 38 (assign* or allocat* or volunteer* or placebo*).ti,ab. 39 crossover procedure/ 40 single blind procedure/ 41 randomized controlled trial/ 42 double blind procedure/ 43 or/34‐42 44 33 and 43 | #1 [mh "hearing loss"] #2 (hearing near/2 (loss* or impair* or partial* or deficit* or deteriorat* or degenerat* or diminish* or difficult* or disabilit* or hard or one side* or unilateral)):ti,ab #3 deaf*:ti,ab #4 (hypoacus* or presbycus* or presbyacus* or sociocus* or nosocus* or anacus*):ti,ab #5 [mh ^"persons with hearing impairments"] #6 {or #1‐#5} #7 [mh ^"Hearing Aids"] #8 MeSH descriptor: [Correction of Hearing Impairment] this term only and with qualifier(s): [Instrumentation ‐ IS] #9 (hearing next (aid* or instrument*)):ti,ab #10 (ear next mold* or earmold* or ear next mould* or earmould* or amplif*):ti,ab #11 {or #7‐#10} #12 (contralateral or bilateral* or binaural or unilateral* or monoaural or (bi near/3 lateral*) or (uni near/3 lateral*) or bimodal):ti,ab #13 ((both or two or one or left or right or single or double) near/3 (side* or ear or ears or fitting*)):ti,ab #14 #12 or #13 #15 #11 and #14 #16 ((both or two or one or left or right or single or double) near/3 (aid* or instrument*)):ti,ab #17 #15 or #16 #18 #6 and #17 |
Appendix 2. Data extraction form
| REF ID: | Study title: |
| Date of extraction: | Extracted by: |
| General comments/notes (internal for discussion): |
FLOW CHART OF TRIAL:
| Group A (Intervention) | Group B (Comparison) | |
| No of people screened | ||
| No. of participants randomised ‐ all | ||
| No. randomised to each group | ||
| No. receiving treatment as allocated | ||
| No. not receiving treatment as allocated ‐ Reason 1 ‐ Reason 2 | ||
| No. dropped out (no available follow‐up data for any outcome) | ||
| No. excluded from analysis1 (for all outcomes) ‐ Reason 1 ‐ Reason 2 | ||
1This should be the people who received the treatment and were therefore not considered ‘dropouts’ but were excluded from all analyses (e.g. because the data could not be interpreted or the outcome was not recorded for some reason)
Information to go into 'Characteristics of included studies' table:
| Methods | X arm, double/single/non‐blinded, [multicentre] parallel‐group/cross‐over/cluster‐RCT, with x duration of treatment and x duration of follow‐up |
| Participants | Location: country, no. of sites etc. Setting of recruitment and treatment: Sample size:
Participant (baseline) characteristics:
Other important effect modifiers:
Inclusion criteria: |
| Interventions | Intervention (n = x): (hearing aid name, type of hearing aid, how this was fitted, hearing aid style, whether volume control is allowed) Comparator group (n = y): Use of additional interventions (common to both treatment arms): |
| Outcomes1 | Outcomes of interest in this review 1. Hearing‐specific health‐related quality of life
2. Listening ability
3. Adverse effects: pain, infection, etc. 4. Patient preference Secondary outcomes/important outcomes 5. Outcomes reported by carer or 'communication partner' [add information on how this was measured] 6. Usage of hearing aids [add information on how this was measured] 7. Health‐related quality of life (generic scale)
‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐ 8. Annoyance scale in patient‐reported outcome measures [add information on how this was measured] 9. Sound localisation as measured by laboratory tests [add information on how this was measured] 10. Speech in noise detection as measured by laboratory tests [add information on how this was measured] |
| Funding sources | "No information provided"/"None declared"/State source of funding |
| Declarations of interest | "No information provided"/"None declared"/State conflict |
| Notes |
1DELETE all the outcomes that have not been reported in the study, leaving behind only the outcomes that are reported by the study.
FINDINGS OF STUDY
CONTINUOUS OUTCOMES
| Results (continuous data table) | |||||||
| Outcome | Group A ‐ Bilateral | Group B ‐ Unilateral | Other summary stats/Notes | ||||
| Mean | SD | N | Mean | SD | N | Mean difference (95% CI), P values etc. | |
| Hearing‐specific health‐related quality of life
| |||||||
| Listening ability
| |||||||
| Patient preference (add information on how this was recorded) | |||||||
| Usage of hearing aids (add information on how this was recorded) | |||||||
| Health‐related quality of life (generic scale)
| |||||||
| Outcomes reported by carer or 'communication partner' | |||||||
| Sound localisation as measured by laboratory tests | |||||||
| Speech in noise detection as measured by laboratory tests | |||||||
| Comments: | |||||||
Appendix 3. 'Risk of bias' table template
| Bias | Authors' judgement | Support for judgement |
| Random sequence generation (selection bias) | High/unclear/low risk | Quote: Comment: |
| Allocation concealment (selection bias) | High/unclear/low risk | Quote: Comment: |
| Blinding of participants and personnel (performance bias) | High/unclear/low risk | Quote: Comment: |
| Blinding of outcome assessment (detection bias) | High/unclear/low risk | Quote: Comment: |
| Incomplete outcome data (attrition bias) | High/unclear/low risk | Quote: Comment: |
| Selective reporting (reporting bias) | High/unclear/low risk | Quote: Comment: |
| Other bias | High/unclear/low risk | Quote: Comment: |
| Other bias: insensitive/non‐validated instrument? | High/unclear/low risk | Quote: Comment: |
