Skip to content
HearingTracker
Log in

Power hearing aids vs Cochlear Implant (no easy choice)

This topic is closed.

111 replies6k viewsLast reply

Jump
Link to this topic
Edited

When it comes to medical issues (or even general issues) people like options. I for one think the world is better with ’s available to who ever wants one. I’d just like in my old age to have a few more options on the table, versus take this or leave it.

I’m not a statistics guy but I do find these numbers extremely interesting. As of today there are approximately 430 million people in the world with a disabling hearing loss. That’s a lot of people like me.

But since CI came out in 1980’s only 736,900 have been surgically implanted in the world, per 2019 calculations. And in the U.S. only 200,000 CI have been implanted again per 2019 numbers.

So when I read 430 million people have disabling hearing, yet only 800,000 willing candidates have agreed to a CI - it just makes me wonder why such a low numbers. Sure some of it is the cost of getting a CI and the fact that some countries don’t even offer such medical treatment.

Yet I think the real reason for low participation is the “no guarantee” someone hearing might or might not improve and the fact that many people are in denial regarding their hearing loss. Or like me - aware of the handicap yet not willing to roll the dice to see what happens. What I’d like to see in CI user numbers is say 20 million people (with disabling hearing) have turned to CI for improved hearing versus saying just 800,000 have.

Again, this is not a knock agaisnt CI’s but just a realistic look at how few people with deafness/severe hearing loss choose to get a CI, versus the millions who have decided not to get one.

In reply to @hass5744

This is a copy and paste from the forum on Facebook.
Pretty amazing.
Read it over and over on that site.

“Yesterday was my activation day. I could hear and understand before I left the office. Her voice was almost normal. there was buzzing at first but was gone after a couple hours. It was so easy. I am 77 and have not had fearing in that ear for 12 years.”

In reply to @stevemink

What I see on the forum is that most people make up their mind not to before ever having an evaluation. I don’t understand how somebody can make a decision without really understanding what’s involved. There are no guarantees in life. One can walk out the door and get struck by a car or suffer many other bad fates.

@MDB said:

I don’t understand how somebody can make a decision without really understanding what’s involved.

This is so true.
I see this over and over on this forum.
Negativity towards something without the evaluation.

In reply to @ssa

That’s interesting. I went to NTID as an backdoor to RIT in 1974. I had profound hearing loss and was the only person in classroom who can hear the phone. I was required to take sign language course. I was there for 1.5 years and none of the teacher were talking in classroom. They signed all the time so l couldn’t understand what they were talking about. Later l skipped classes and worked part time as production assistant and later as engineering assistant in the color tv studio at NTID. I had to drop out and on my last evening there, l talked to my counselor on the phone that l was dropping out. I had lots of telephone training when l was growing up.

In reply to @Raudrive

@anon33641277 said:

But what if “damaged equipment” is the brain?

@Raudrive said:

Exactly……you are not a CI candidate.
Thanks for sharing.

I’ve got a friend who struggles to understand speech, more so due to her brain not understanding rather then her profound loss.

She has now got a Naida Marvel and Altho it’s a struggle still and really need to lipread still and use sign, she picks up way more sounds including speech with her CI. Can’t understand speech but she can hear people talking.

Still no where near perfect but she says it’s a massive improvement.

They were not sure if she should be implanted but they did agree in the end.

Having something in ‘her head’ is not really something that she thinks is an issue.

Massive improvement to life in her own words.

In reply to @ssa

I just wanted to say thank you for sharing this perspective. I’m not a candidate, but I’m a tech junkie that loves learning more and more about things as they come out or develop further.

What did it feel like around the first few weeks to month after the activation? Were you slowly starting to learn to process sounds? Did you just wake up one day and suddenly start hearing things? I’d like to hear more about your success!

In reply to @Zebras

@Zebras said:

Massive improvement to life in her own words.

I can see why, many big D (Deaf) i know of wear it so they can hear environmental and enjoy music, environmental and music just sound better with CI, I can tell you that it is so rich and detailed than with my hearing aid.

Edited

In reply to @JJTheJetPln

@JJTheJetPln said:

What did it feel like around the first few weeks to month after the activation? Were you slowly starting to learn to process sounds? Did you just wake up one day and suddenly start hearing things? I’d like to hear more about your success!

I woke up one day, it just started working, I heard only up to 500 hz when i was activated. one frequency range at a time, the cochlea (high pitch) needed more time to wake up. I had one good ear with excellent speech understanding and I had no problem adjusting to just one hearing aid ear so I just waited it out .

Not sure how to describe it but it felt weird at first, it is like a tickle sensation and hearing nothing (was extremely surprising) except for the very low freq like a knock on wood… It sounded like a higher pitched version of a knock but the tonoscopic mismatch was resolved a year later as my brain figured out the pattern and fully merged in with my .

In reply to @ssa

Please don’t spread false information. Its common knowledge that do not do well with music. In fact most CI users are unable to enjoy music through their implant. Also its common knowledge CI do not work well with incoming background noise. There are certainly many pluses with a well fitted and properly adjusted CI’s. Unfortunately listening to music or trying to communicate with someone in noisy situations is not one of them.

@stevemink said:

Its common knowledge that CI do not do well with music. In fact most CI users are unable to enjoy music through their implant. Also its common knowledge CI do not work well with incoming background noise.

These are an incorrect statements.
Generalizing about music and background noise is very wrong.

Each of us with have different experiences.
For me I hear pretty good in noisy environments. Some music is pretty good too but not all.
Both noisy environments and music are getting better and better for me. It’s all about practicing in those environments.

Edited

In reply to @stevemink

That totally not true, I beg to differ. I hear very well in noise and music sound better with than with hearing aid. You don’t know what you don’t know. (you haven’t experienced CI and how the brain adjust to it, brain plasticity is amazing)

I think you are missing the brain plasticity part of it. A lot of the work is done in the brain. CI sends patterns which the brain eventually figures it out, just need a reliable way to send it to the brain and CI is 100x better at sending data to the brain than a broken ear .

You really need to see this ted talk: it explains the brain plasticity

Can we create new senses for humans?12

As humans, we can perceive less than a ten-trillionth of all light waves. "Our experience of reality," says neuroscientist David Eagleman, "is constrained by our biology." He wants to change that. His research into our brain processes has led him to...

In reply to @stevemink

@stevemink said:

In fact most CI users are unable to enjoy music through their implant.

My friend works as a professional musician but she wears hearing aids BUT she works with a bilateral user who professionally works as a musician so no a CI is good for music.

I wondered when I read the double negative if it was what I logically followed, or if you were somehow going back on it. It reads like can be good for music as I see it now, which is how I originally interpreted it.

WH

Related discussions