A Different Cochlear Implant Story
Friday September 7, 2007
When I began reading "Lemonade aides 4-year-old girl from Ecuador," (AzCentral.com, September 6, 2007). I thought it was going to be just another child-gets-an-implant story. Until near the end - when it is revealed that the child was born without a cochlear nerve. So now the monies raised to help her, are going to pay for sign language tutoring. How common is this condition, being born without a cochlear nerve?
Comments
We have a local family near me that is fostering a child from Honduras with the same situation. This family is cuing with the child.
I wonder if “born without a cochlear nerve” might be an expression local to doctors of that area. I haven’t heard of it here in the USA. Also curious to know how this is tested for.
This is a condition which is ALWAYS tested for in the cochlear implant candidacy testing process. It is a long process, and the CT scan helps doctors verify that there is a viable nerve AND cochlea. Contrary to what DC advocates will have you believe, surgeons will never implant unless they know there are both, and that the child is actually a candidate by quantifiable testing (ABR, ASSR, hearing aid trials, etc.)
Fortunately there is a new device which is beginning to help those with no viable nerve. It is called the Auditory Brainstem Implant. It is still in the infancy stages of use, and is not FDA approved for children under 12 in the US (I don’t think more than a couple of hundred people have yet received them, but they are seeing promising results).
I was born deaf. While growing up, I was told that I had nerve damage. When I was a teenager, I was tested to see if I could get a Cochlear Implant or not. The Cat scan and MRI showed that I had no nerve damage at all. I got the Cochlear Implant and have no problems. Through other tests, I was born deaf because of genetics.
I was wondering if anyone can give me an explanation to something I just read. A patient with neurofibromatosis lost her hearing as a result of the removal of a tumor that was growing on her brainstem. Several months later, she received a cochlear implant and restored her hearing. This confuses me - doesn’t the implant only work if there is an intact nerve? and doesn’t it mainly serve as a cure for those who have a hearing loss as result of hair cell damage? not any nerve damage?