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Otology/Neurotology

(064) Bimodal Cochlear Activation: Hearing Improvement and Quality of Life Analysis

Monday, October 2, 2023
2:45 PM – 3:45 PM East Coast USA Time

    Presenting Author(s)

  • Andrea De Vito, PhD,MD

    ENT Unit Director
    Health Local Agency of Romagna
    FORLI', Emilia-Romagna, Italy

Disclosure(s):
Andrea De Vito, PhD,MD: No relevant relationships to disclose.


Introduction: The aim of this study is to evaluate the improvements in hearing gain and quality of life in a group of patients undergone synchronous bimodal cochlear implant (CI) and hearing aid (HA) activation.

Methods: From December 2021 to November 2022 have been enrolled patients undergone CI for unilateral profound post-lingual sensorineural hearing loss (SNHL), with mild to severe SNHL in the other side. A synchronous bimodal activation of CI and Hearing Aid (HA) has been done 20 days after surgery.
Six months after bimodal activation, the intelligibility achieved was evaluated performing a free field voice test , in quiet and noise, using CI and HA separately and then CI&HA combined. To evaluate verbal perceptive abilities, the "verbal perception test for adults" was used 4-6-8-10 months after surgery, performing a vocal audiometry with only implant and then with bimodal stimulation. The complete intelligibility spatiality quality (CISQ) questionnaire was used to evaluate the outcomes of quality of life.

Results: 15 patients have enrolled in the study. The study group was homogeneous about hearing deprivation in the implanted ear (average 5 years), time of CI&HA daily use (12-14 hours), and severity of hearing loss in implanted ear (80-90 dbHl VO) .The hearing gain obtained with bimodal activation is significant in noise, highlighting also a significant increase in word recognition scores with bimodal modality compared to the use of the CI alone. The CSIQ test confirmed the better hearing performance, particularly in noisy environments.

Conclusions: To our knowledge, the synchronous activation of CI and HA represents an innovation in most audiological centre. Aids fitting is usually performed 6 months after CI activation in order to obtain a better performance in CI functioning. Our study, even if performed on a limited number of patients and in absence of a control group (patients with only CI), confirm the advantage of bimodal activation, especially in noisy environments, and a better and faster hearing gain, even if acoustic potentials in implanted ear are not optimal .