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Life as a Military Audiologist and Application of Evidence-Based Practice

Presenter: Patrick Pead, Au.D., CCC-A, CPS/A

Abstract: Military audiology is more-often-than-not encountering scenarios in which you deal with non-traditional audiologic cases. Performing 700 air-conduction audiograms in an austere environment, bedside vestibular assessments in tactical vehicles, and tinnitus management/habilitation for service members with normal hearing thresholds became common place. There is not a robust database of peer reviewed articles on military specific audiology, but I found that even in challenging clinical circumstances evidence-based principles can be applied, most of the time, to provide exceptional audiology care. In my military career I was frustrated by the limited military specific audiology research. However, I did not let this limit my clinical pursuits and instead joined with the military research bodies to assist in research studies. My clinical practice benefited greatly from real time evidence gathering because I was able to alter my clinical practice based on our collected data.