The U.S. Veterans Affairs Medical Center in Portland, Oregon, is conducting a two-year research project to explore whether using the Ida Line tool and motivational interviewing techniques can lead to increased hearing-aid use in previously unsuccessful hearing-aid users. This marks an important step to further develop a strong evidence-base for using the Ida Motivation tools with patients.
The VA Audiology System is one of the largest dispensers of hearing aids in the United States. Despite spending millions of dollars on hearing devices each year, however, many veterans do not use their hearing aids consistently.
This pilot investigation will explore whether the Ida Motivation Tools and motivational interviewing techniques can help patients make the behavioral changes necessary to ensure positive hearing-aid use. Once the data is collected and analyzed, the pilot study can potentially lead to a large-scale randomized trial involving multiple sites in the VA audiology system.
“We are very excited about the research project. When looking at the literature in our field that focuses on the stages of change model, most of the literature looks primarily at individuals who are considering hearing aids. These individuals are just starting to enter the entire change process,” states Samantha Lewis, principal investigator for the project. “We are looking at something different: at patients who have hearing aids, but are not using them regularly or not using them at all.”
The study will be a randomized clinical trial, where unsuccessful hearing aid users will be randomized to either receive a motivational interviewing intervention (treatment group) or to review standard literature with an audiologist (control group). The treatment group will be introduced to the Line tool in a manner that is consistent with motivational interviewing methods. The audiologist will then work collaboratively with the patient to develop a joint strategy to overcome barriers to hearing-aid use.
Data collection will start in October 2013 and proceed until 2015. The goal is to collect data from 30 patients in the treatment group and 30 patients in the control group. Outcome measures collected will include an assessment of hearing-aid use, a hearing-aid questionnaire, an assessment of importance and readiness to change, two self-efficacy surveys, and an open-ended interview.
“By the conclusion of the project, we will have collected a lot of valuable data on what works well and what does not work as well to motivate patients to use their hearing aids,” states Samantha Lewis.
Audiologists who will participate in the study are currently receiving training from health behavior coaches on interviewing techniques and how to incorporate the Line tool into their consultation. This will ensure that the consultation sessions are practiced in a way that is consistent with the motivational interviewing principles presented in the 2013 edition of Miller and Rollnick’s book on motivational interviewing.
Samantha Lewis is a staff investigator at the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs’ National Center for Rehabilitative Auditory Research (NCRAR) in Portland, Oregon. She is also an assistant professor in the Department of Otolaryngology at the Oregon Health and Science University.