Application of the cochlear implant to profoundly hearing impaired adolescents: re-visiting the inclusion criterion for older children

Abstract

Objective: The purpose of this study is to examine the range of outcomes for older children receiving the multi-channel cochlear implant. Recent improvements in the speech perception performance for profoundly hearing impaired children and adults have lead to expanded selection criterion for cochlear implant inclusion. That is, the efficacy of cochlear implants for adults with acquired hearing loss is well documented. In addition, the application of the cochlear implant to young children has lead to improvements in open set speech perception, speech production and language acquisition. In contrast, congenitally deaf and prelingually deafened children who are implanted after the age of 8 years have performed poorer than children implanted at a younger age on speech perception, speech production and psychophysical performance measures.