I don’t watch House, or much TV at all honestly, but apparently they had a patient receive a cochlear implant on the show tonight. I read a summary of it in Nabeel’s blog and just from reading that decided I should make a ‘that’s not how it works, folks’ post, just in case.
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 was pretty dumb. I was disappointed. Not to mention that they used the mother as the interpreter, instead of the hospital hiring an interpreter.
Dumb is right. There were outrageous inaccuracies and unprofessional behavior in the doctor. For example, the doctor alone made the decision to implant while the patient was still on the operating table. The patient then wakes up hearing things drop, slam and rustle. He recognizes his name when spoken. He can’t stand the onslaught of sound and can’t turn it off. At another point the patient rips out his implant in a gory scene. There is a lot of talk about Deaf culture which appears silly and irrelevant because of the overwhelming Hearing bias of the show. It was confusing to follow the interaction between the characters — a problem with the the captions. The script was so poorly researched that it came off as totally ignorant.
Dr. House and the writers of the show are so far ignorant. I’ve removed the show from my TiVo season pass and all those shows in the past that I thought were pure genius but now I view them as fraudulent and biased. Did the cochlear implant industry put them up to this?
Hi Sara
I blogged about House too. I’m not up in arms about it as the show usually has rubbish medicine on there, it’s drama not medical school after all.
I did think the same as you and blogged to reassure my friends and family that that’s not how its going to happen.
Take care now, good luck for your operation.
xxx
Mog’s last blog post: House, last night’s episode
I haven’t seen the episode but I have read some things about it….I might try to find it online at some point. Either way it was a joke from what I have heard.
Anyways…..TOMORROW is the BIG DAY!!!!
Be careful driving to Chapel Hill tonight and enjoy your surgery!! It is almost over!
Shows like this lead to ignorant internet posts like this:
http://sudrin.livejournal.com/968069.html
Do deaf people really have such an identity with deafness that they would turn down the ability to hear? It seems like a huge gimmicky hollywood thing and it annoys me
yes, i’d turn down the ability to hear. because how i hear….er, ‘differently’…. is me, my life.
i tried a hearing aid, once. it was awful, every single day. it wasn’t for me – it was for other people, and it hurt like hell.
my ‘loss’ is also a great gift. i’m a very visual person and i -need- that ability much more than i need to hear.
some people want to hear. some don’t. i’m a don’t.