CI Recipient of 9 months with Skin Question

How long have you had CI?
As swelling goes down from the surgery the magnet may be too strong and irritating the skin. This can be itching or pain with redness.
When this happened to me I did a chat with Cochlear America and they sent out the next wesker magnets within a couple days.

Sometimes at the end of a day I just need to scratch the implants when the processors are taken off. It just feels good.

Hope this helps.

@cali4nyagirl firstly what CI do you have?
If you have N7/N8 you can adjust your own magnet strength in the coil. Just give the magnet a 1/4 turn to try a weaker strength magnet. Keep 1/4 turning magnet every 3-4 days to see if that helps. If you go to far the magnet will fall out so be careful.

If this doesn’t help you can buy some moleskin to put between the magnets. You buy this from a fabric shop.

Failing the above you should speak to your AuD to see what he/she suggests. You could always make your AuD your first stop so they can check your skin isn’t broken. And they will try to fix your problems.

Good luck.

@joanhawsey said:

Once or twice a week I put the magnet over my hair to cushion the skin a little.

I would think putting anything between magnet and implant would cause instability. Guess a lot depends on how active you are with head movements, etc.

I see the adjustment as just loosening the magnet like a screw or a bolt. It would also easily fall out and possibly get lost if not click locked into position as described in the manual.

The reason I bring this up is it might create a misunderstanding of how it’s designed to function teaching people the wrong way to use them with questionable results. On one of my audiologist visits the audiologist found one of my magnets not click locked in place. He said it needed to be locked and he tightened it to the locked position.

Just thinking out loud.

@Raudrive said:

Sheryl, are you sure about this?

Rick when I had the N8 by the end of the week my magnet site was red. The CI AuD that I saw said to loosen the magnet, she showed me how to do it. It might not even be 1/4 turn needed, she just turned mine out off the lock position. So that would be less than a 1/4 turn. She explained by loosening the magnet it takes it a bit further away from the reddened site reducing the tight fit against the skin… When I went back again with still streaming problems I saw a different AuD. She looked at my magnet site and said that loosening the magnet did fix my reddened spot.

The 2nd AuD I saw said it’s not in the manual but it’s a trick they have learnt.

I would be cautious. I had soreness but tried to brave the magnet and I wound up with a sore that compromised skin, as my surgeon said, and I had to stop wearing Nucleus8 for a month for it to heal, because if it got bad enough to break skin there would be danger of infection and I’d have to have implant removed. My audiologist knew I had pain, but had me start wearing Kanso2 anyway, assuming the pain was because I was still swollen. It might be wise to check with your surgeon rather than audiologist. I also went down in magnet size, and now wear a 1/2 magnet, and have exchanged the Kanso2 for another Nucleus8. When you hear it’s a beautiful thing, not worth taking chances.

As kmliptak warned it is a serious issue that needs addressing by your audiologist. I had the #5 to start with and had great connection but my audiologist noticed that the magnet had caused a slight indent. This can lead to complications and possible issue with the tissue surrounding the implant. If you are getting headaches, then it’s time to speak to a clinician. My magnet was brought back to #4 and we will see if the indentation reduces over time.

Thank you so much for your response. I’ll have to try putting the magnet over my hair occasionally. I seem to have a corner spot like you do that gets more tender at time. I do have a sensitive head. When I wear a clip in my hair or wear a ponytail my head gets sore at times. Thank you again. Your response has been helpful.