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Curious why so many do not consider cochlear implant

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Good to know that is an option. I’ve never heard that. My husband is still trying to get through the after a year. He is in an appeal process now. He hasn’t used VA in the past.

My audiologist suggested I go for an eval and I qualified. I’ve had them for 4 years, love them. Cochlear Nucleus 7 Nucleus 8 on order. ( approves upgrades at 3 yrs.)

Very little pain, just took Tylenol on the first one. I had no pain after the second.
I was able to understand words before I left activation. At 3 months I was at mid 90s wrs.

In reply to @Baltazard

I would say more discomfort than pain in my case - nothing Ibuprofen couldn’t handle for a day or two. I had a quick adaptation - similar to Butch. That is not always the case - some with little hearing left at the time of implant may need to do a lot more rehab to help the brain relearn how to hear with the new input. I figured the hearing was only going to get worse, so why not look for a way to get my hearing better. Pain is relative to people’s attitudes in some cases. We are currently conditioned to a “no pain” mind set. Well, anything being cut into on our body will come with a little pain, but if it is temporary, it’s well worth it in my boat. Kind of like having children, and as a female I compare all pain to labor. Not much comes close after three kids.

My is similar and in some frequencies, worse than yours but I do benefit from hearing aids still so I want to leave it as long as I can before I have to consider . I have been previously assessed in my early twenties but my word recognition with hearing aids was too good to qualify at that time.

Sounds like you have looked into it. Note that if your assessment was years ago, the standards for implantation have been changed to allow for earlier while you still have activity going on in your cochlea and can adapt more quickly in some cases. I am not certain of UK system, however.

In reply to @joanhawsey

It’s been a while since I was assessed under the NHS so I suspect their criteria has changed as well so I probably would be eligible but while hearing aids (I wear Oticon Intent) continue to work well for me, I am rest assured that I do have another option if hearing aids no longer work for me in the future.

In reply to @Baltazard

Holy cow, poor woman. I can also think of another to add to your list of giving birth, however that is another topic - and a disagreeable one at that - so I’ll leave that alone.

In reply to @user648

There are a number of members here on the forum who are . Some have mentioned with the VA.

I would think the VA could help you with CI of you mentioned it to your VA audiologist.

In New Zealand the national government provides a fixed number of free operations per year, but the criteria is biased towards youth to give them a boost in their growing up.
Private operations cost an average of US $25,000 to $30,000 so cost is a major barrier.
Socially (based on my limited personal asking around) the use of CI to help older persons with hearing loss just doesn’t have much traction as a possible solution.

@paul.cleary.nz said:

Socially (based on my limited personal asking around) the use of CI to help older persons with hearing loss just doesn’t have much traction as a possible solution.

That’s too bad.

I can say Medicare here in the USA supports the older people concerning . If a person worked for a living Medicare supports them with CI. Bilateral CI has been life changing for me.

Reading through this thread I see many who are just scared of CI without admitting it. There are many reasons for not taking the chance to hear better. When your hearing gets bad enough, CI is a great opportunity.

Not anymore they have been a full ci center for a few months now. That site needs to be updated. I go to wrj for my issues.

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