3 month post-op

Yesterday I went back for my 3 month research appointment at Washington University. As part of this research study, I go through different listening tasks once before surgery, and at 1-month, 3-month, 6-month, 9-month, and 12-month post-op. The testing usually lasts about 4 hours. Yes, 4 hours. As you can imagine, I was very exhausted by the end of it.

The goal of the study is to determine what benefits (if any) can be reached for persons with an asymmetrical sensorineural hearing loss. These individuals may have one ear that audiologically meets cochlear implant candidacy but the other ear does not because that person is able to achieve better results on speech perception tests with a hearing aid than necessary to meet typical cochlear implant candidacy criteria. However, people with this kind of hearing loss often struggle more so than the tests show, especially in noisy environments (and when with multiple speakers) and they also cannot localize sounds (determine where sound is coming from).

I sat through a lot different speech perception testing. For those who know what these tests are, this included the following:

100 CNT words with my left ear only (hearing aid side)

100 CNT words with my right ear only (CI side)

HINT sentences at 0 degree aszmuth in a R-Space (restaurant noise is presented from speakers surrounding me) with BOTH CI/HA

The same test with my HA only

BKB sentences while wearing CI/HA in multiple conditions (speech and noise at 0 degrees azmith, speech at 0 degrees and noise at 270 degrees, speech at 0 degrees and noise at 90 degrees)

The same test in all conditions wearing my HA only

TIMIT sentences at 50 dB HL with CI/HA,

TIMIT sentences at 50 dB HL with HA only

Another test somewhat like BKB sentence test but the level of noise changes depending on my answer with my CI and HA and then HA only.

I don't have the full results as of yet, but Laura (my audiologist) and I agreed that I had made a noticeable improvement compared to my 1 month post-op. At 1 month, I was very bothered by the noise and did not see much difference in results when comparing CI/HA and HA only. During yesterday's testing, I got more words and sentences correct when I wore my HA and CI than when I wore my HA only. I could not do any tests with just my CI. I could hear the words but they all sound similar. I did get a couple CNT words right though!

I also responded more easily with both my CI/HA on. I'm not sure I scored much better with both my CI/HA than with my HA only but I was certainly quicker to respond and more confident about my answers. I was also doing better when sentences were presented at a very soft level and in noise.

I was happy to see that I am making progress. Laura and I believe I will continue to progress over the next 6 months, 1 year, or even 2 years. It will be interesting to see how I do clinically when I'm working. I think it will be easier to communicate with my patients than before. I'll also need to figure out how to configure an FM system with both my HA and CI so that I can take full benefit of both ears when I perform audiometric testing....

I also had my map reprogrammed. My CI thresholds in the booth were in 25-35 dB range but in the 40s in the higher frequencies. My T-levels had increased in the higher channels. My new map should help improve my thresholds in the higher frequencies. My overall T-levels are increased also which should help me hear more soft sounds. Today, everything is somewhat louder than before but not bothersome :) I think it will be easy to adjust to this time. :)