Hearing Aids and Cochlear Implants Is there a difference? ASL II

Hearing Aids External Can be very powerful “turns up the volume” Most common form of “correction” of hearing loss

HEARING AIDS

They Come In All Shapes And Colors

Types of Hearing Aids

Who are Hearing Aids for? Hearing aids can be worn by people with all types of hearing loss, But they work best for people with Conductive hearing loss

Cost Range of Hearing Aids The range of a hearing aid can cost anywhere from $3,000 to $6,500 a piece Insurance should cover initial cost of hearing aids

Damage to Hearing Aids Standard things that cause damage to our electronics (water, animals chewing, small children etc.) will cause damage to Hearing Aids. Easily lost with small children. Insurance WILL NOT cover the replacement costs.

The Cochlear Implant: The History In 1957, A. Djourno and C. Eyries in France, William F. House at the House Ear Institute in Los Angeles, F. Blair Simmons at Stanford University, and Robin Michelson at the University of California, San Francisco, all created and implanted single-channel cochlear devices in human volunteers. In the early 1970s, research teams led by William House at the House Ear Institute in Los Angeles; Graeme Clark at the University of Melbourne, Australia; F. Blair Simmons and Robert White at Stanford University; Donald Eddington at the University of Utah; and Michael Merzenich at the University of California, San Francisco, began work on developing multi-electrode cochlear implants with 24 channels. In 1977, Adam Kissiah, a NASA engineer with no medical background, designed a cochlear implant that is widely used today. In 1991, Blake Wilson greatly improved the implants by sending signals to the electrodes sequentially instead of simultaneously - this increased clarity of sound.

What Does is Look Like?

Surgery? CIs are surgically implanted into the ear This is major surgery –Anytime you cut into the skull you are risking brain injury The surgery drills into the cochlea and leaves the machine in there in a spiral shape. They then place the skull back in place and install the inner transmitter. Doctors place the skin over the inner transmitter and sew the opening closed.

When do you get one? Depends on the parents. Deaf Culture is against implanting at a young age. Speech and language acquisition is against NOT implanting at a young age. They implant as young as 12 months; the FDA recommends 24 months In Europe, they start implanting at 6 months

Cost of a CI Exceeds $40,000 (each ear) Plus the cost of –Pre and Post doctor visits – post-operative aural and oral rehabilitation process –speech therapy and any other training needed to fully gain best usage of the CI

Cochlear implants “last” roughly 20 years. You might have to replace the cochlear implant at some point in those 20 years. You can implant each ear 2 times.

Can you hear with an implant? It doesn’t sound like normal hearing; more like a robot CIs wearers must go through extensive training to learn to understand what they are hearing most research shows there is very little significant difference between hearing aids and CIs in their ability to help the wearer “hear”

Hearing VS Language 4HQIog

Hearing Loss and Cochlear Implants: What’s it Sound Like? Hearing Loss Simulation Website