This chart is from a paper I just read. It basically shows that in their study people with a CI benefited quite a bit from using a hearing aid in the unimplanted ear, even with hearing only at 125 Hz.
Welcome
I'm a 30-something year old girl originally from upstate NY and now living in central Virginia. My background is in mechanical engineering and I worked full time as an engineer for 8 years. In 2010 I quit my job and started a laser engraving business.
I lost my hearing at age 14 and have been using hearing aids since then. In April 2009 I received my first cochlear implant. That went really well so in December 2009 I got the second. The CIs are what prompted me to start writing publicly - but I try to cover other things as well.
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It makes me wonder why go bilateral unless your implanted ear has an exceptional result and the odds of another CI is greatly in your favor of significent improvements and insurance somehow will foot the bill.
I know a lady getting a 2nd CI even though she has enough residual hearing in her other ear to be aided to near normal hearing(unaided 85db to 95db and she can hear 8000Hz too!) and insurance is paying for the 2nd CI too!
How many people would get one CI, let alone two if insurance didn’t get so lax and those candidates needed to pay the $50,000+ out of pocket? Many could never afford it and even some of those that could, they would stick with HAs as theres more important things to spend $50k on.
Theres a big debate nowdays on people getting CIs because they want to upgrade and it’s the greatest and latest, They have enough residual hearing to achieve great benefits with their HAs but hope CI might be better and if insurance foots the bill, it costs them nothing.
Yes I know it’s all about speech reception nowdays and I scored a 72%(online test you linked us to http://www.medel.com/US/Rehabilitation/adults.php what did you score by the way) which is amazing considering how bad my hearing is. My audiologist actually doesn’t recommend any CI for me at this time and says I can train my ears to have enough speech reception that I wouldn’t qualify for a CI anyway.
I can always consider a CI in the future when my hearing gets much worse and CI technology gets better. Then ill achieve a significent and real benefit. What’s the hurry now if me and others with enough residual hearing do just fine with the best HAs? I know youve made your choice, I am surprised but sincernly wish you luck and a great CI result.
http://www.medel.com/US/Rehabilitation/adults.php
Ace’s last blog post: My audiologist said if I had only 100db hearing loss, id hear perfectly when aided.
I scored 73% on this medel thing… Hmm…
Addenum to last comment… That was on a setting of both voices, normal, and quiet, and 10 sentences…
OK –
These auditory therapy things aren’t designed to test your hearing – they are designed for recently implanted people to relearn how to hear sounds. I did the one from advanced bionics and scored perfectly until the highest level. Too much help from the visual cues.
Sara’s last blog post: The other kitty
I got 95% using the same settings as Anna. The only part that I couldn’t hear clear enough was Has or Had. Sees or Saw were tricky but not that hard.
Sara’s last blog post: The other kitty
Wow if you are understanding 95% already with your HAs, you are doing better than alot of CI implantees. One of the CI users(she’s bilateral) scores around 90%. You have way more hearing than me, that’s why I scored only 72%. Well that and I need more gain so I can hear better.
Ace’s last blog post: My audiologist said if I had only 100db hearing loss, id hear perfectly when aided.