Step 2 taken Today - There is no turning back now

Yesterday I felt some pain, about 2-3 on the 0-10 scale, with the 3 coming as the Hydrocodone wore off.

My entire day yesterday was devoted to the implant. We got up at 6 AM left the hose at 9AM and checked in at 9:30AM the finally took us back to a prep room at 10:30 and I changed into a gown and they started my IV Line.

At 12:30 PM they came and walked me back to surgery, which was a first for me. I’m labeled a fall risk du to my inner ear issue. I experience sudden bouts of dizziness and vertigo with no warning at times. In fact I just had one standing in the kitchen and had to go sit down.

They got me on the table, started the O2 and IV line and the next thing I knew an angel in scrubs was calling gently to me that it was time to wake up when I had gained my senses, I asked what the time was and she told me it was 3:00 and I had been in recovery for an hour.

My wife said she had talked to the surgeon, and the surgery took about 1 1/2 hours. She forgot to ask him about the placement of the coil, but we will find out soon enough if he was able to accommodate my request. I had requested that the coil be placed in-line with my ear so that my collection of Stetson hats could still be worn.

You mentioned you weren’t familiar wit a bone conduction hearing aid, but you have a CI. The Bone conduction processor attaches to my skull magnetically and passes the sound signals through a coil to the implant. The implant is similar to yours, except instead of sending out several discrete signals to an electrode threaded down my cochlea, the signal goes to a piezoelectric crystal that is mechanically coupled to a titanium screw that is threaded into a hole the surgeon bored in my head just behind my left ear.

When sound comes into my system and is converted to an electrical signal, the screw vibrates my skull so that the ear on the right side of my head (the functional ear) can pick up the vibrations and convert them into signals my brain understands as sound.

The end result is that I will hear sound through both ears, but the sound in my left ear is so attenuated, that my brain will process the sound coming in n the right. I’m still holding out hope that my brain might somehow associate these weaker signals in the left with the much louder signals in the right and relearn how to hear.

Okay, I know that’s a pipe dream, but a guy can hope. always possible the hearing in the left could deteriorate further and be lost altogether, but it’s stated stable since 1995 when it switched off, so I’m betting it won’t.

Sorry this turned into one f those TLDR threads, but I’m stoked about this. I’ve been trying to get a CI for two years and a CROS for ten years before that, but the money was never there.

Thanks for the explanation, very helpful
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I am guessing you didn’t do a CI because of a nerve issue.

Our implants are not that far off different, different processing the final sounds.

When will the implant be activated?

I’ve probably got the comprehension percentages wrong, I just know they said I didn’t qualify. Trying to figure out Medicare makes my head ache.

I hear ya.
It is not just Medicare, it’s the entire medical system.
I wish you good luck with your implant.

The doctor removed the stitches yesterday and I’m now scheduled for activation on January 9.

I’m not very familiar with forums. If anyone has done this surgery and wants to tell me how they are with Osia it would give me comfort. I can’t find anyone in Italy. Thank you

There are not many people with Osia on this forum that I am aware of.
@TexOkie and @jeffrey are the only ones I can think of now. Both have been very helpful when asked

I have the Osia on my right side only. I love it! The surgery is relatively easy; most people–all? come home the same. My recovery was relatively pain free–I mean, it was very easy. I had neck pain for two days, and that’s typical. This is because the surgeons have to hold the patient’s head over to side to perform the implant.
there’s an entire forum dedicated to Baha aid where Osia comes up a lot–I’ll try to chase down the address. Tons of kids have had this.Many parents post videos of the moment when their child’s Osia is activated and frankly it’s extremely moving to see the parents burst into tears when their child suddenly hears their voices clear as a bell. The reaction from parents on that forum has been almost entirely positive, and most say their kids love the Osia.
I have medium length hair and most people don’t see the Osia at all. No one has ever asked about it. and anyway, who cares?
wait, here’s the forum:

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ah, shoot: it’s called Cochlear Osia Support Group.
don’t be freaked out by the pictures of sewn up wounds taken two days after surgery. It’s not nearly as bad as it looks and the swelling and all the rest goes down soon enough. One of the GREAT things about BAHAs and the Osia is that it’s NON-invasive, in the sense that the surgery only involves the outer skin and bone of the skull. again, this is relatively easy compared to what ENT surgeons normally do.
So yes, I HIGHLY endorse getting the Osia. I was a very early adopter–the first person my surgeon implanted with the Osia. My audi thought it would be good and she was right! Most folks seem to prefer the Osia to the older style Baha that use a ‘stump’ protruding from the skull. These last are prone to infections.

@TexOkie i don’t know very much about the Osia at all. Does it have a magnet in the processor where it attaches to the skull? If it does , I wonder if the magnets to strong?

I’ve found with my CI as the years roll by I now require less magnet strength than at the start due to pain around the magnet site. I get pain around the magnet site resembling what you described

Other than that I’m sorry I can’t help you more. Good luck for the rest of your journey.

Yikes, sorry to hear that. Best wishes! I hope this is readily resolved. Keep us informed. By the way, my guitar teacher is an Oklahoma kid from way, way back. He’s always telling stories about his friends and family from those days. He visits frenquently but there aren’t many folks he knew still living.

The magnet in the Osia sensor and processor is the same as in your CI electrodes and processor. The coupling through the skin works exactly the same way. The difference is the signals in your CI are routed to individual electrodes implanted in your cochlea. The sensor in the Osia receives the signal from the processor and routes the electrical impulses to the piezo crystal that is in contact with the titanium screw that is screwed into my mastoid bone. The signals cause the crystal to vibrate according to their frequency and amplitude thus recreating the sounds that I should be hearing. The screw vibrates the bone, which in turn vibrates my skull. Both cochlea receive the vibration and decode it as sound, thus giving me heating from my deaf side in my hearing side, while also providing some hearing to the deaf side to receive if it can.

I’ve lost track. Has your Osia been activated? And if so, what are your impressions?