An audiometer is a medical device that is used to evaluate the hearing threshold of a person. An audiologist, doctor, nurse, a qualified occupational health professional or other suitably trained professional uses an audiometer to determine the hearing threshold and to identify as well as quantify the degree of hearing loss present in a process called audiometry.
During audiometry, the audiologist or hearing care professional will use the audiometer to present tones of different frequencies (pitches) at different intensity levels (volumes) to the patient’s ear and the patient will respond via a response button, indicating the tones they have heard.
The objective of audiometry is to find the patients' hearing threshold, which is the lowest level (per frequency) at which the person can hear the stimulus. Results are usually displayed or printed on an audiogram.