Aural/Oral Performance of Children with Cochlear Implant under Monaural and Bimodal Listening Conditions: A Parental Evaluation

This study compares the functional language performance of Tamil-speaking children (n=30) who received a cochlear implant (CI) before 2 years of age (earlier implanted group: EIG) and between 3 and 4 years of age (later implanted group: LIG). Everyday functional language of children was evaluated by interviewing parents using the adapted Parents’ Evaluation of Aural/Oral Performance of Children (PEACH) Questionnaire in Tamil language. On average, both groups of children had difficulties in everyday language functioning. However, functional results of EIG were better than those of LIG. In addition significant correlations were found between age at intervention and PEACH score. The evidence lends support to early intervention increasing the functional performance of the children fitted with CI. PEACH can be a clinically feasible evaluation tool to implement in practice for clinicians to obtain meaningful information regarding children’s auditory performance in real life at childhood.

Download Full-text

Comparison of Speech Perception Abilities of Children using Bimodal Hearing with Children using Cochlear Implant Alone

Annals of Otology and Neurotology ◽

10.1055/s-0040-1715930 ◽

2020 ◽

Author(s):

Gauri Belsare ◽

Sharda Sarda ◽

Prakash Bhardwaj ◽

Sai Belsare

Keyword(s):

Speech Perception ◽

Cochlear Implant ◽

Test Pattern ◽

Hearing Aid ◽

Pattern Perception ◽

Oral Performance ◽

Identification Test ◽

Monosyllabic Words ◽

Age Range ◽

Bimodal Hearing

Abstract Introduction There are very few studies comparing speech perception abilities of children using bimodal hearing over monaural cochlear implant and factors related to benefit of bimodal hearing. The aim of this study is to compare speech perception abilities of children using bimodal fitting versus children using cochlear implant alone and explore factors related to benefit of bimodal hearing. Materials and Methods In the present study, 20 cochlear implantees with the hearing age range of 3 to 8 years were included. Speech perception performance was assessed by means of Parent’s Evaluation of Aural/Oral Performance of Children scale and early speech perception (ESP) test: Pattern Perception Words, Monosyllabic Words, Bisyllabic, and Trisyllabic Words Identification test. ESP test was carried out in two conditions cochlear implant with hearing aid in opposite ear (CIHA), bimodal, and cochlear implant (CI) alone. Aided audiometry was also carried out in above mentioned two conditions. Results and Discussion On aided audiometry test, aided thresholds were improved by 5 to 6 dB in CIHA condition as compared to CI alone condition in 14 out of 20 children. Whereas on speech perception test, there was a significant improvement of 15 to 20% on domains of ESP test in these children. Factors such as implant age, chronological age, and number of hours of hearing aid usage were not significantly associated with benefit. Nevertheless aided threshold at 4,000 Hz was found to be significantly associated with bimodal benefit. Conclusion Bimodal hearing is beneficial in most of the children than monaural hearing through cochlear implant.

Download Full-text

Comparison of the Normal and Noise-Suppression Settings on the Spectra 22 Speech Processor of the Nucleus TM 22-Channel Cochlear Implant System

American Journal of Audiology ◽

10.1044/1059-0889.0403.55 ◽

1995 ◽

Vol 4 (3) ◽

pp. 55-58 ◽

Cited By ~ 3

Author(s):

Laura K. Holden ◽

Margaret W. Skinner ◽

Timothy A. Holden

Keyword(s):

Cochlear Implant ◽

Noise Suppression ◽

Speech Processor ◽

Implant System

Download Full-text

Letter to the Editor Concerning Skuk et al., “Parameter-Specific Morphing Reveals Contributions of Timbre and Fundamental Frequency Cues to the Perception of Voice Gender and Age in Cochlear Implant Users”

Journal of Speech Language and Hearing Research ◽

10.1044/2020_jslhr-20-00563 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 63 (12) ◽

pp. 4325-4326 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

Hartmut Meister ◽

Katrin Fuersen ◽

Barbara Streicher ◽

Ruth Lang-Roth ◽

Martin Walger

Keyword(s):

Cochlear Implant ◽

Fundamental Frequency ◽

Stimulus Type ◽

Voice Perception ◽

Letter To The Editor ◽

Gender And Age ◽

General Influence

Purpose The purpose of this letter is to compare results by Skuk et al. (2020) with Meister et al. (2016) and to point to a potential general influence of stimulus type. Conclusion Our conclusion is that presenting sentences may give cochlear implant recipients the opportunity to use timbre cues for voice perception. This might not be the case when presenting brief and sparse stimuli such as consonant–vowel–consonant or single words, which were applied in the majority of studies.

Download Full-text

Perceptual Learning of Vocoded Speech With and Without Contralateral Hearing: Implications for Cochlear Implant Rehabilitation

Journal of Speech Language and Hearing Research ◽

10.1044/2020_jslhr-20-00385 ◽

2020 ◽

pp. 1-10

Author(s):

Martin Chavant ◽

Alexis Hervais-Adelman ◽

Olivier Macherey

Keyword(s):

Cochlear Implant ◽

Perceptual Learning ◽

Speech Signal ◽

Training Phase ◽

Monosyllabic Words ◽

Low Pass ◽

Contralateral Ear ◽

Number Of Individuals ◽

Insight Into ◽

Vocoded Speech

Purpose An increasing number of individuals with residual or even normal contralateral hearing are being considered for cochlear implantation. It remains unknown whether the presence of contralateral hearing is beneficial or detrimental to their perceptual learning of cochlear implant (CI)–processed speech. The aim of this experiment was to provide a first insight into this question using acoustic simulations of CI processing. Method Sixty normal-hearing listeners took part in an auditory perceptual learning experiment. Each subject was randomly assigned to one of three groups of 20 referred to as NORMAL, LOWPASS, and NOTHING. The experiment consisted of two test phases separated by a training phase. In the test phases, all subjects were tested on recognition of monosyllabic words passed through a six-channel “PSHC” vocoder presented to a single ear. In the training phase, which consisted of listening to a 25-min audio book, all subjects were also presented with the same vocoded speech in one ear but the signal they received in their other ear differed across groups. The NORMAL group was presented with the unprocessed speech signal, the LOWPASS group with a low-pass filtered version of the speech signal, and the NOTHING group with no sound at all. Results The improvement in speech scores following training was significantly smaller for the NORMAL than for the LOWPASS and NOTHING groups. Conclusions This study suggests that the presentation of normal speech in the contralateral ear reduces or slows down perceptual learning of vocoded speech but that an unintelligible low-pass filtered contralateral signal does not have this effect. Potential implications for the rehabilitation of CI patients with partial or full contralateral hearing are discussed.

Download Full-text