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Children with Cochlear Implants

The controversy over implanting kids is gradually dying down, but here's some history for those who are interested.

September 2003 - Here's another report from the SHHH convention. This one is about the effect of cochlear implants on children's social and cognitive growth.

October 2004 - CI proponents have long claimed that the earlier a person receives an implant, the more it will help them. It seems logical to me, and virtually all studies have verified that theory. Here's an article that reviews some of that research.

November 2004 - Should local school districts pay for CI maintenance costs?

April 2005 - It seems that the Deaf community is becoming ever more accepting of cochlear implants. Schools for the Deaf, which have long been the foundation of Deaf culture, are increasingly offering programs for kids with CIs.

May 2005 - I doubt there are many folks left who question the premise, but here's additional evidence that implanting children younger generally provides earlier and better language development.

December 2005 - Stanford researchers report that children implanted after the age of 30 months do not develop the ability to integrate lipreading information with auditory information.

January 2006 - Age barriers soften for cochlear implants

February 2006 - South Dakota Pays for Kids' Cochlear Implants

May 2006 - Playground slide can damage cochlear implants

May 2006 - Children with cochlear implants doing well In mainstream classrooms

June 2006 - Children with cochlear implants perform like normal hearing children

June 2006 - Cochlear implants changing park district's 'camp sign'

August 2006 - Three month old baby receives cochlear implant

August 2006 - Cochlear Implant Resources for Children and Families

August 2006 - Familiar signs ease a child's transition to the world of hearing

September 2006 - Post-CI Auditory Training Tough for Some Kids

October 2006 - Cochlear Implants And Speech Skills Following Meningitis

November 2006 - 6-Month-Old Receives Bilateral Cochlear Implants

November 2006 - Cochlear Implant Collaborations Aid School Success

December 2006 - Deafness Debate: Cochlear Implants and Children

December 2006 - Oklahoma Medicaid Denies Second Implant

January 2007 - Ear implant success sparks culture war

February 2007 - Study looks at benefits of 2 cochlear implants in deaf children

March 2007 - Sound or silence? Implants give deaf people option

June 2007 - Two CIs are Better than One for Kids

June 2007 - Canada Not Yet On Board with Bilateral CIs

July 2007 - Cochlear Announces CI Products for Kids

July 2007 - Educators Guide to Cochlear Implants

September 2007 - Younger CI Recipients Have Stronger Language Skills than Hearing Aid Users

September 2007 - CI Kids Excel in Mainstream Classrooms

September 2007 - Implant surgery and therapy keep kids on track

November 2007 - Bill Proposed to Have State Cover Cochlear Implant Surgery

February 2008 - Swimming with a cochlear implant

April 2008 - Audiologic Contributions to Pediatric Cochlear Implants

May 2008 - New Children's Book about Cochlear Implants Now Available

August 2008 - CIs Improve Speech Access for Deaf Kids

August 2008 - Is Implanting Children Earlier Always Better?

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South Dakota Pays for Kids' Cochlear Implants

February 2006

Editor: South Dakota's Department of Rehabilitation has a program that provides cochlear implants to children under 5 years of age! Does your state have such a program?

Here's the press release.

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HB 1158 appropriated funds during the 2005 Legislative Session to provide funding for cochlear implants to children less than 5 years of age with a severe to profound hearing loss.

A cochlear implant is a surgically implanted device that assists an individual with severe or profound hearing loss to hear sounds.

The Division of Rehabilitation Services, through the Department of Human Services, administers the Cochlear Implant Program. Funding for this program is provided through revenue collected from the telecommunication relay fund for the deaf.

This program is designed to provide financial assistance to an eligible individual who is uninsured or to help offset the deductible or coinsurance for an individual with an insurance plan that covers cochlear implants. The program provides funding for the cost of the implant surgery for one ear, one implant device, surgeon fee, hospital fee, the initial mapping and up to a maximum of 12 follow up mappings within one year post surgery.

For an application or more information regarding the Cochlear Implant Program, contact Janet Ball at (605) 773-4644 or toll free at (800) 265-9684.

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Children with cochlear implants doing well In mainstream classrooms

 

May 2006

 

The WRAL Health Team has been following the Allen family of Wake Forest since 1999. That's when 7-month-0old Evan Allen was the youngest child in the country to receive a cochlear implant. All three of the Allen children have cochlear implants. Their success hasn't come without a lot of work at school and at home. It is time for a little Spanish at Heritage Elementary in Wake Forest. Just a few years ago, someone like Evan Allen might struggle just to speak English. Evan was born deaf like his older sister Bethany and younger brother Layton. Cochlear implants help each of them hear and have a chance to learn, speak and play with other children who hear normally. Their teachers say they fit right in.  Full Story

 

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Children with cochlear implants perform like normal hearing children

 

Hearing impaired children with cochlear implants produce academic results on a par with normal hearing children. It is a common perception that the performance of hearing impaired children in school suffers because of their hearing loss. Two studies indicate that this does not apply to children whose hearing loss is treated with cochlear implants.  Full Story

 

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Cochlear implant success is music to the ears

 

August 2006

 

Rhonan Scowcroft will soon hear his parents' voices and his sisters' giggles for the first time after he became the youngest Australian to receive a Cochlear implant. The 3 month-old boy is also one of the youngest people in the world to have a bionic ear, which will be switched on by an audiologist in a few weeks. His mother Tammie said last night after arriving home from the Sydney Cochlear Implant Centre that Rhonan was 10 hours old when his hearing problem was picked up through the newborn screening program at Canberra Hospital. Two subsequent tests confirmed Rhonan was profoundly deaf.  Full Story

 

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Cochlear Implant Resources for Children and Families

 

August 2006

 

This list includes a selection of the resources that the Cochlear Implant Education Center has found useful when working with students and families in our demonstration schools. This does not represent a complete list of the many resources that may be available. The absence of a resource on this list does not indicate that we do not support it; it may never have come our way. We are always in the process of trying out new things.  Full Story

 

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Cochlear implants changing park district's 'camp sign'

 

June 2006

 

Historically, day camps for deaf kids are rather quiet places. When a soccer goal is scored, for example, the players don't applaud -- they wave their hands and wiggle their fingers. That's changing, though, as more deaf and hard of hearing children are being equipped with cochlear implants, a surgically implanted device that allows them to "hear" through electrical impulses. When Sarah B. Faber joined the Chicago Park District nine years ago, only a couple of kids in the district's summer day camp program for deaf and hard of hearing children had the implants. Today, about half of the 70 youngsters who attend the three park district summer camps wear them, said Faber, the district's program specialist for deaf and hard of hearing.  Full Story 

 

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Familiar signs ease a child's transition to the world of hearing

 

August 2006

 

Last December, [six-year-old Davin Handy] had cochlear implant surgery. Thanks to the receiver implanted near his left ear and the components he attaches to his head, he can now hear most sounds, although in a mechanical, tinny way. He can also speak with a growing vocabulary. But Davin, who attends a Deaf and Hard of Hearing kindergarten class at Pasadena Lakes Elementary School, still does much of his communicating with sign language. Some people consider that a problem. Davin and his mother consider it the best way to ease his transition. His goal is to be in a mainstream first-grade class next year.  Full Story

 

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Post-CI Auditory Training Tough for Some Kids

 

September 2006

 

For a moment, Jia Billadeau slumps her head on a table in frustration. It's Monday morning at St. Joseph Institute for the Deaf, where several days a week the 3-year-old practices hearing and listening. Here, Jia sounds out the long "oh" of "open" when Shawnda Fuller, her aural rehabilitation audiologist, opens a toy barn to reveal plush cows. She listens for the word "walk" when she's asked to move those cows around a child-level table. But sometimes the sounds are hard, and she's tired. Though Jia's encouraged with smiles and help at every turn, it's difficult to listen and talk constantly when you've only been hearing for a few months.  Full Story

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6-Month-Old Receives Bilateral Cochlear Implants

November 2006

Children's Memorial Hospital says it implanted a cochlear implant hearing device into the youngest child to ever receive one in the state of Illinois. He is six-month-old Bennet Hass. He received the implants in both ears after newborn testing revealed a problem. Bennet's hearing loss is the result of a genetic problem that wasn't discovered in his older brother until he was 15 months old. Now both Bennet and his brother have received the implants. Bennett's implant was turned on for the first time Wednesday at the news conference. He initially was alarmed but turned when he heard his daddy call his name for the very first time. Full Story

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Cochlear Implant Collaborations Aid School Success<

Parents, Schools, and Implant Centers Build Winning Partnerships

November 2006

Cochlear implants (CIs) are one of the most significant technological achievements of the 20th century that have improved the outcomes for children with profound hearing loss-and greatly changed the ways professionals provide medical and educational care to these children. One key component in successful outcomes is a partnership between parents, educational professionals, and cochlear implant centers to work together to foster achievement of the communication goals set for the child by the child's parents. This article provides answers to questions that parents frequently ask CI centers about promoting improved communication and collaboration between the child's school and the implant center. Full Story

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Deafness Debate: Cochlear Implants and Children

December 2006

Seven preschoolers sang along with teacher Garrett Adams as he made a squirrel puppet bob along with the words. Donning paper headgear and tails turning them into crows and squirrels, they sang, "Gray squirrel, swish your bushy tail, wrinkle up your funny nose, hold a nut between your toes." You could not tell from their voices that they are deaf. They were in a classroom at Northampton's Clarke School for the Deaf and Center for Oral Education, where sign language is not on the curriculum. "Most people think that if you're deaf, then you must sign," said the school's director, Dennis B. Gjerdingen. "We don't think our kids are handicapped or disabled. We think it's an advantage for them to be able to hear. Call it what you will, they don't have to be deaf," said Gjerdingen, who has severe hearing loss at high frequencies.  Full Story

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Oklahoma Medicaid Denies Second Implant

The Johnson's say when their son Jacob was born, he failed three hearing tests at the hospital. Doctors diagnosed him as profoundly deaf when he was just 10 days old. In April, Medicaid paid for Jacob to have a cochlear implant installed in his right ear. Now, he can hear sounds, but his parents say doctors told them a second implant would give him the chance for full hearing capacity. Jacob's mother says they were devastated when Medicaid denied them the second implant. She says he's already made so much progress with just one. "Oh, he started saying 'mama' about a month after it was activated and they had me start counting how many words he was saying," said Jennifer Johnson. "He was saying so many words that I've lost count, it's over 50."  Full Story

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Sound or silence? Implants give deaf people option

More parents are choosing implants to help deaf children such as Drake Weland hear. But some deaf leaders say the decision is a big one and the devices are not for everyone. Drake Weland's parents are almost certain he would not want to live in silence. Drake was 11 months old when tests showed he was profoundly deaf. A doctor told his parents that an electronic implant could deliver sounds to his brain and help him learn to talk. The doctor said the devices, called cochlear implants, work best in babies - so Drake's parents had the surgery done right away. Their choice is increasingly common, especially for the 90 percent of deaf babies born to hearing parents. But the practice concerns some deaf people, who say that parents should wait until children are old enough to decide for themselves.   Full Story

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Younger CI Recipients Have Stronger Language Skills than Hearing Aid Users

Editor: Here's more evidence that providing children with CIs at an early age greatly increases their chance of having normal language skills.

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September 2007

Children with profound hearing loss who receive cochlear implants before the age of 6 show significant gains in language acquisition, and compare favorably with other children who can hear, according to a new study.

The research, first presented at the American Academy of Otolaryngology-Head and Neck Surgery Foundation's Annual Meeting & OTO EXPO in Washington, DC, indicates that children that receive cochlear implants scored higher on language assessments test, compared to children fitted with non-implanted hearing aids.

According to the study, which profiled 36 children whose average age at implantation was 3 years old, children with profound hearing loss prior to their development of language benefited from cochlear implants. Over 50 percent of those studied had language scores similar to their hearing peer within two years of cochlear implantation.

Cochlear implant technology, which allows for direct stimulation of the auditory nerve, provides an improved auditory experience for children with profound hearing loss. Over 20,000 cochlear implants have been performed in children worldwide over the past two decades.

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CI Kids Excel in Mainstream Classrooms

September 2007

A beige plastic device the size of a quarter that peeks from his sandy blond hair is the only visible sign Adam Ballent is profoundly deaf. He takes notes as his teachers lecture in class at Naperville North High School. He hollers on the soccer field when his club team scores. He recites the Boy Scout pledge with other members of his troop. "Sometimes, when it's really noisy, I can't hear what people are saying," said Ballent, his words easily understood. "But most of the time, I can." Ballent never learned sign language. He has no deaf friends. And at age 16, the sophomore is at the forefront of a wave of deaf children with cochlear implants who are entering mainstream classrooms across the country, following a path paved with high hopes and bitter controversy. In 1996, after major advances in the revolutionary technology -- which stimulates auditory nerves in the inner ear and costs about $50,000 -- the first "oral deaf education" school in Illinois opened to teach young children with cochlear implants how to speak and hear. Since then, Child's Voice, in Wood Dale, has served more than 130 children, with many graduates going on to school districts throughout northern Illinois. Several similar programs have sprung up.  Full Story

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Implant surgery and therapy keep kids on track

September 2007

Gibson, Brecken and Andrew were all born with profound hearing loss. All wear cochlear implants. And thanks to the device, all are speaking and communicating at an age-appropriate level. "People tell me these kids are talking all the time," Vaubel said. "And that's the best compliment I could ever get." Gibson, Brecken and Andrew are part of a small community of Mankato-area children with cochlear implants. Together the three attend a twice-weekly preschool taught by Vaubel - along with their other traditional preschools - where they are trained in language skills. . . . "Our hope is that by combining programming with the (implant) procedure, these kids will reach kindergarten and be able to function just like any other student in the classroom," said John Klaber, Mankato special education director. "And we think we'll be at the point with all those kids."  Full Story

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Bill Proposed to Have State Cover Cochlear Implant Surgery

November 2007

About one year ago, the only thing Troy Nguyen would say to his school secretary was the word "fish." Now, with the help of a new hearing device, a formerly shy young boy has turned into a chatterbox.  Nguyen, an eight-year-old from Lowell, was born almost completely deaf and used a clunky hearing aid that precluded him from playing sports and participating in OTHER school activities.  Last year, just two weeks before Christmas, Nguyen got the gift of a lifetime, a cochlear implant from the Boston-based Gift of Hearing Foundation. Now he likes to talk about the Red Sox and the Patriots, and was excited about his ninja costume this Halloween.  "His vocabulary improves everyday," said Nicole Leitow, his teacher at the S. Christa McAuliffe Elementary School. "He's very much getting socially what he's supposed to be getting."  Now, Rep. James B. Eldridge has filed a bill that would increase the amount of health insurance coverage for children in need of cochlear implants. If passed, operational costs, post treatment services and the $60,000 device would all be covered by Massachusetts Medicaid.   Full Story

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Swimming with a cochlear implant

February 2008

You can't swim with a cochlear implant, you say? At least not with the external part. Well, it turns out that you can if you seal the external part in a waterproof bag! And here's a video that shows exactly how one family does it! They also go out of their way to make sure you understand that this procedure is NOT approved by the CI manufacturers. But it has worked for them!  Here's the video!

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Audiologic Contributions to Pediatric Cochlear Implants

April 2008

Twenty-eight years have passed since the first American child received a cochlear implant in 1980. The implant, the single-electrode system engineered at the House Ear Institute, also was the first cochlear implant to undergo U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) clinical trials in adults. The first child to receive an implant in the United States in 1980 was a 10-year-old boy who was congenitally deaf and communicated exclusively through sign language. The following year, the first preschool-age child received an implant-a 3-year-old girl who had been deaf for six months due to meningitis and whose parents hoped that she would remain an oral communicator (for the first publications, see Eisenberg & House, 1982; Eisenberg, Berliner, Thielemeir, Kirk, & Tiber, 1983). The implantation of children was fraught with controversy and formidable adversaries. This tumultuous reaction was not surprising, however, because a similar reaction had occurred earlier with the implantation of adults. U.S. investigations into cochlear implants for deaf adults were initiated in the 1960s, primarily in California, despite strong disapproval by the scientific community. The early pioneers were otologists-William F. House (House Ear Institute), F. Blair Simmons (Stanford University), and Robin Michelson (University of California, San Francisco). The controversy stemmed from basic scientists' belief that initial experiments should be carried out on animals. In contrast, clinical investigators were convinced that early trials should be conducted with adults who were deaf, and who up until that time could not be helped by medical intervention. Scientists applied a yardstick of normal hearing in defining successful cochlear implant outcomes, but clinical practitioners held the view that enhanced audition could only be gauged from a perspective of no usable hearing. It is noteworthy that the clinical perspective has changed over the years as performance with a cochlear implant has improved. Current studies with children are, in fact, now using control groups of children with normal hearing.  Full Story

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CIs Improve Speech Access for Deaf Kids

August 2008

A team of researchers found the increased access to sound that cochlear implants have provided to profoundly deaf children has allowed them to develop English speech and language skills more successfully than using hearing aids alone, according to a study listed by the journal Audiology & Neurotology. The purpose of this study was to determine how well early post-implant language skills were able to predict later language ability. Thirty children who received a cochlear implant between the years 1991 and 2000 were study participants. The Reynell Developmental Language Scales (RDLS) and the Clinical Evaluation of Language Fundamentals (CELF) were used as language measures. Results revealed that early receptive language skills as measured using the RDLS were good predictors of later core language ability assessed by the CELF. Alternatively, early expressive language skills were not found to be good predictors of later language performance. The age at which a child received an implant was found to have a significant impact on the early language measures, but not the later language measure, or on the ability of the RDLS to predict performance on the CELF measure.  Full Story

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Is Implanting Children Earlier Always Better?

August 2008

Results: In general, the developmental trajectories of children implanted earlier were significantly better than those of children implanted later. However, the advantage of implanting children before 1-yr old versus waiting until the child was between 1 and 2 yrs was small and only was evident in receptive language development, not expressive language or word recognition development. Age at implantation did not significantly influence the rate of the word recognition development, but did influence the rate of both receptive and expressive language acquisition: children implanted earlier in life had faster rates of spoken language acquisition than children implanted later in life.   Full Story