Smart Remote Hearing Screening: 82% Fewer Hospital Visits
ConsultAssistent improves the traditional hearing screening process at the audiologist'soffice withdigital, remotely assessed hearing screening.
Patients with hearing problems visit the audiologist for a hearing test and a video of the ear. When the results may require medical examination, a referral to the ENT doctor follows. In practice, however, it often turns out that the hearing loss is normal, so the hospital visit was unnecessary and the patient can still return to the audiologist for a hearing aid. This leads to unnecessary hospital visits, long waiting times, valuable time spent by the ENT specialist and additional travel and healthcare costs.
How ConsultAssistent Improves the Process
Using ConsultAssistent’s digital hearing screening, ENT specialists—along with the digital audiogram and otoscopy results from the audiologist’s examination—now evaluate these patients remotely. This allows the ENT specialist to quickly determine:
- Normal hearing loss → the patient can return to the audiologist immediately
- Medical instructions → the patient is scheduled for a hospital visit
Our pilot study shows that this leads to a tremendous gain in efficiency:82% of patients ultimately did not need to physically visit the hospital.
Benefits for Patients and Healthcare Providers
- Fewer Unnecessary References
- Shorter wait times at the ENT clinic
- Faster Clarity for Patients
- More efficient use of specialists' time
- Lower travel and healthcare costs