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Cochlear implant question

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Recently watched an episode of New Amsterdam in which a deaf patient was so dissatisfied with her cochlear implant that it was surgically removed. (Although not discussed, it seemed like she found all the noise in her life overwhelming) Wouldn’t just not wearing the speech processor accomplish the same thing (make things quiet again)? I realize medical shows are not a great source of information but it would be nice if they didn’t promote misinformation.

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You are correct. Not wearing the external part effectively deactivates a . Assuming there is no medical reason to remove it (and there isn’t 99.9% of the time), just take it off.

I do this all the time when I get tired of noise. Every day life is fine, but sometimes when I’m around a group, or a loud event, I get overwhelmed by the “wall of sound”. So I just take it off for a while. Easy-peasy.

I just watched a snippet on YouTube. I think it is because she has been deaf all her life and hearing all these sounds now clearly was too overwhelming for her. Have you heard of Jazzy on YouTube? She also never wears her because she cannot deal deal with noises and so lives completely deaf and communicates using . I think if you have acquired speech and hearing (but lost it later on in life like I did) then a CI would make a huge improvement. Just my opinion. My assessment is next month and still unsure what will happen.

@MDB said:

Although not discussed, it seemed like she found all the noise in her life overwhelming

If this is the case I can understand it. Going from a very quiet world to one with noise sure can be overwhelming.

Hearing loss tends to push us away from people, be more solitary. This process can take years for some.

A new world of sound can stress relationships as well.

There have been times I turn my processors way down just to get a break from all the noises of life. This has gotten less and less as time passes with . There is acclimation for sure.

I get the being overwhelmed part. The part I thought was bad was rsurgically emoving the device for no reason–she could just not use the speech processor.

In all my reading about only one person removed the implant for non medical reasons. That person never learned how to hear using the CI, frustrated to the point of having the implant removed.

I wonder if there is more to the story you read.

Just like here on this forum. So many opinions about CI. Almost all negative ones come from those that do not have an implant.

This wasn’t “real.” It was from the TV show New Amsterdam. I get the idea of being overwhelmed with noise. I just thought the story was very misleading. I’m guessing there are ways to acclimate deaf people to hearing again (wearing for limited hours and lower volumes) and if all else fails, just don’t wear the processor–no need to surgically remove unless there are issues with infection (or perhaps pain?)
Was basically wanting to confirm my impression that surgically removing the device wasn’t necessary to shut down the noise.

@MDB the recipient has 2 choices they can do.

  1. Just not wear the processor as you suggested. If the person has any residual left they could still hear from that ear. But it could be very muted.

  2. They could have the electrodes simply turned off or deactivated.

IMO having the internal devise removed is unnecessary. They have 2 other choices.

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