Air Conduction Testing is when the earphones are placed in/on the patient's ears.  The tones are presented to the patient and the patient responds when they hear the sound.  The goal of this test is to find the patients thresholds, or the softest that the patient can hear the tones.  This test allows the clinician to determine the level of hearing loss (if any) that the patient has at the frequencies tested.  Both ears are tested individually.

Bone Conduction Testing is when the bone conductor (a special headband) is placed on the patients head.  The tones are again presented through the headband and the patient responds when they hear the sound.  The goal is to find the patients thresholds.  This test allows the clinician to determine what type of hearing loss (if any) the patient has.  Both ears are tested individually.

Speech Reception Threshold testing is completed utilizing the earphones.  Words are read off and the patient repeats the word they hear.  The words start out at a comfortable volume and continue to get softer until the patient can no longer hear/understand the speech.  This test is used to confirm the Air Conduction test results.

Word Recognition Testing is completed utilizing the earphones.  Words are listed off at a comfortable volume that was determined by the patient prior to testing.  The purpose of this test is to determine how well the brain is processing what the patient is hearing.  There is a list of 25 words given and an overall score is given for the right ear, left ear and then in both ears.

Speech in Noise testing is completed utilizing the earphones.  A set of sentences is presented that the patient needs to repeat back to the clinician.  With each sentence, the loudness of the background noise is increased slightly.  The purpose of this test is to determine the volume level where background noise really becomes an issue.  It also allows the clinician to test how well the patients brain is able to process out the background noise.

Tympanometry (or Immittance Testing) allows the clinician to test the function of the middle ear system.  This is completed by placing a probe in the patients ear and emitting a stimulus.  This test helps confirm the type of loss and also rules out possible middle ear dysfunction (i.e. an ear infection or negative pressure) as the source of hearing loss.

Otoacoustic Emissions testing is completed utilizing an earphone.  A set of tones is presented to the patient and the responses from the auditory nerves are recorded.  The patient is not required to respond in any way as the equipment is taking all the measurements.  This test is used to confirm that there is indeed a hearing loss present (or not!) and also helps confirm the type of loss.