1. Duration of cochlear implant use in children with prelingual single-sided deafness is a predictor of word perception in the CI ear.
- Author
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Arras T, Boudewyns A, Dhooge I, Zarowski A, Philips B, Desloovere C, Wouters J, and van Wieringen A
- Subjects
- Humans, Female, Male, Child, Child, Preschool, Time Factors, Longitudinal Studies, Persons With Hearing Impairments psychology, Persons With Hearing Impairments rehabilitation, Surveys and Questionnaires, Speech Intelligibility, Hearing Loss, Unilateral rehabilitation, Hearing Loss, Unilateral psychology, Hearing Loss, Unilateral physiopathology, Hearing Loss, Unilateral surgery, Comprehension, Treatment Outcome, Child Language, Deafness psychology, Deafness rehabilitation, Deafness physiopathology, Deafness diagnosis, Deafness surgery, Age Factors, Child Behavior, Motivation, Infant, Cochlear Implants, Cochlear Implantation instrumentation, Speech Perception
- Abstract
As part of a longitudinal study regarding the benefit of early cochlear implantation for children with single-sided deafness, the current work explored the children's daily device use, potential barriers to full-time device use, and the children's ability to understand speech with the cochlear implant (CI). Data were collected from 20 children with prelingual SSD who received a CI before the age of 2.5 years, from the initial activation of the sound processor until the children were 4.8 to 11.0 years old. Daily device use was extracted from the CI's data logging, while word perception in quiet was assessed using direct audio input to the children's sound processor. The children's caregivers completed a questionnaire about habits, motivations, and barriers to device use. The children with SSD and a CI used their device on average 8.3 h per day, corresponding to 63 % of their time spent awake. All children except one could understand speech through the CI, with an average score of 59 % on a closed-set test and 73 % on an open-set test. More device use was associated with higher speech perception scores. Parents were happy with their decision to pursue a CI for their child. Certain habits, like taking off the sound processor during illness, were associated with lower device use. Providing timely counselling to the children's parents, focused on SSD-specific challenges, may be helpful to improve daily device use in these children., Competing Interests: Declaration of competing interest Financial support was provided by Cochlear Ltd, in the form of cochlear implants and the funding of the clinical mapping. Dr. Tine Arras and Dr. Birgit Philips are research employees of Cochlear Technology Centre Belgium, and they are both shareholders of Cochlear Ltd. The other authors have no interests to declare., (Copyright © 2024 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.)
- Published
- 2024
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