Phonological Awareness, Vocabulary, and Reading in Deaf Children With Cochlear Implants

"Age at cochlear implantation had a significant effect on vocabulary and reading outcomes.." according to a recent article in the Journal of Speech, Language and Hearing Research. "There is a benefit of earlier implantation."

doi:10.1044/1092-4388(2009/08-0139)

The effect of mismatch between electrode assigned frequencies and perceived pitch

A study from an Italian facility found that a "mismatch between frequencies allocated to electrodes and the pitch perceived on stimulation of the same electrodes could partially account for our subjects' difficulties with speech understanding in noisy conditions."

Bilateral and Unilateral Cochlear Implants and Speech Perception in Noise

A recent study found that bilateral cochlear implant users showed significantly better ability to understand speech in noisy environments when compared with unilateral cochlear implant users.

A similar recent study compared bimodal and bilateral cochlear implant users. The conclusion: "This research adds to the existing studies that show no significant difference between bimodal and bilateral cochlear implant users".

Second Implant Can Help Adult Localize Sound

University of Wisconsin research detects a benefit from bilateral cochlear implants.

Cochlear's Acquisition of Sieman's Hearing Aid Division

Cochlear Limited's proposed acquisition of Siemen's hearing aid division discussed here.

Surgical Approach and Postoperative Vertigo

Researchers at the University of Berlin investigated "the impact of different cochleostomy techniques on vestibular receptor integrity and vertigo after cochlear implantation." Comparing a group of 62 patients who "underwent implantation via an anterior or round window insertion approach" they concluded the "round window approach for electrode insertion should be preferred to decrease the risk of loss of vestibular function and the occurrence of vertigo."

Cochlear implant performance in senior citizens

A recent study of implanted middle aged and older adults found statistically significant improvements in sentence and single syllable word recognition. The authors conclude that "conclude that age should not be a criterion for deciding who should receive cochlear implants."

Expressive Spoken Language Development in Children with Cochlear Implants

Researchers assessed expressive spoken grammar skills of young children with cochlear implants and compared them with normally hearing children. Of the children studied who were between the ages of four and six years, 58 percent were "at or above the expressive spoken language grammatical level of normally hearing three year olds after three years of consistent cochlear implant use".

International Cochlear Implant Reliability Group Achieves Agreement on Standards

The International Consensus Group for Cochlear Implant Reliability Reporting has been working to develop a "consistent and comprehensive classification system for the implanted components of CI systems". The Journal of Otology and Neurotology reports that the Group has reached agreement on the following:

Standard definitions for device failure, survival time, clinical benefit, reduced clinical benefit, and specification were generated. Time intervals for reporting back to implant centers for devices tested to be "out of specification," categorization of explanted devices, the method of cumulative survival reporting, and content of reliability reports to be issued by manufacturers was agreed upon by all members.

Advanced Bionics HiRes 90K Surgical Tool Catalog

For the DIYers....

Benefits of Advanced Bionics High Resolution Mode

Researchers in Germany found that compared with conventional Clarion speech coding strategies, "speech perception performance increased significantly when changing... to High Resolution Mode."

The technology of stimulation rates between 1500 and 5000 pulses per second per channel brings a benefit for all users. However, the fastest possible rate does not necessarily lead to best hearing performance in each individual subject. Individual optimization of stimulation rate is recommended.