CI Rehabilitation after Activation

Cochlear Implants
#126

My point was not to equate the procedures but to shed light on the pace of development. Lazik (RK back in 1970) was a procedure discovered by accident when a patient in Russia suffered damage to their cornea from broken glass. After treatment and recovery, they discovered his vision actually improved. The surgeon developed the initial procedure that involved making incisions around the cornea to change the focal length. There were serious complications that were highly dependent on the skill of the surgeon. It was eventually replaced by lazers and have gotten much better and safer.

CI has been around for almost the same length of time and while there have been improvement (channels, processors, software), it is still far behind the advances made for lens implants and Lazik. I accept that it is hard, but I dont see enough effort by companies to make it MUCH better.

#127

Maybe part of the problem is that CI is performed at hospitals and there is little incentive for them to improve. It is covered by insurance and that’s the driver. Lens implants are performed in clinics that are often privately owned and use other outpatient facilities for the actual surgery. They are focused on making a profitable growing business, so improvements come naturally to them.

My experience with my CI was that the hospital had their own ways of doing things even to the exclusion of some of the advances in technology that were available to them from the CI companies. Most fought for years using the RW for entry. Data on successful trends has been very hard to find in published journals. Ditto complication trends.

It is still highly dependent on the skill of the surgeon operating by feel or in the blind. Practices change slowly.

#128

I think cochlear implants have made huge progress in the last 50 years. Apart from what @Neville said above, you’re talking about stimulating something with tens of thousands of nerve endings being stimulated with an electrical cable and zappers. We just can’t make something with that many endings in such a small space (yet) so there’s no way we’ll get the resolution necessary to replicate normal sounds.

Your examples above would be more fair if you used retina replacement instead of lens replacement, and taste bud replacement instead of dental crowns.

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#129

Live person for 45 minutes per day for about 6 months. Reading words from prescribed word lists while I tried to work out what they were.

Later, moved on to playing notes on a piano.

And then streaming some of those apps listed above but I never found them helpful. Listening to podcasts streamed to the cochlear was much more helpful. But not as good as a live person.

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#130

I really don’t know a lot about retinal implants, but I agree that it is a better comparison. That said, it doesn’t look like progress has been as good as with CIs according to wiki:

#131

For some reason the idea of retinal implants gives me the willies far more than a CI.

Had a co-worker who was active duty Air Force and was medically retired for it. He was a consultant to the USAF when I worked with him. Man, I sure wish there was something effective they could do for him. He planned on becoming a school teacher.

WH

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#132

I always just think of that scene in First Contact where Picard’s eye gets stabbed by the borg.

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#133

I’m liking Neville’s comparison of CI to retinal implant, altho CIs have been around a lot longer. Part of the issue is that both retinal and Cochlear implants involve surgery that’s literally on top of primary sensory nerve bundle. LASIK, while certainly intricate and done on very delicate tissue, is done on a body part that in itself is mostly inert, the cornea/lens of an eye. There are no nerves and no blood vessels.
A retina or a cochlea is almost entirely made of tissue that’s packed with a variety of specialized cells and their specific and specialized nerve endings.not sure about retinas, but I’ve read papers that imply researchers have “tied” specific hair cells to particular brain areas. That’s more intricate than I can wrap my head around.

The other thing that makes me pause about CIs is implantation involves a skilled person (or their robotic equipment) and very sophisticated, miniaturized hardware. No such hardware is involved with LASIK.

All that said, I do wish “they” were progressing faster and further than they seem to be. Maybe the market just isn’t big enough to get the $$. Maybe the trends like this forum toward more consumer inclusion will help.

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#134

Well. . . but also. . . what if instead of putting money into progressing CI technology we put money into progressing gene therapy and just make the cochlea regenerate.

I think the latter is, unfortunately, much further off. But it is certainly more desireable. So we split our priorities.

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#135

Nightmare worthy. Ugh.

WH

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#136

Especially for those of us contemplating eye surgery later in the year. Thanks @Neville!

#137

Cataracts? Truly a piece of cake. Results are amazing too.

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#138

My mom: Why did I wait so long. It was so easy.

I think she thought it would be long and painful. She was kicking herself for putting it off.

WH

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#139

You’re off to be assimilated! I hope it goes well. :grin:

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#140

Yes, cataracts. They’ve been mentioned at my last three yearly eye tests. It’s only the last guy who said that you don’t have to wait until they’re a real problem to get them done. Thanks for the positivity. I might stop procrastinating now.

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#141

This got me to thinking about my second appointment. Without double checking I believe mine was at a month. Things really started changing for me after the second appointment. At 2 months I knew I would go bilateral and began the process to get that done. At 3 months I did get the second implant.

Your progress has been faster than mine so I would expect you to do every bit as good as I have at least. This may be part of the robot controlled implant too, not sure.

My first month was very frustrating at times because I did not do as well as many I had read about. I really wondered if I had made a huge mistake. Then the second appointment happened and things got better and better.

Something I wanted to ask you to try is streaming an old known TV show to your implant with captions on. This was a night/day learning experience for me.

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#142

Loss of residual - my surgeon aid 50/50 and doesn’t seem dependent on surgeon skill. Mine is gone and I had a lot to lose, but it’s OK.

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#143

I got mine as soon as I could so I could ditch my glasses - the surgery for both was cheaper than a new pair of glasses. Very pleased. If you have any trouble driving at night, you qualify. It feels much safer now. I’m 61

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#144

Thanks Joan. It will be nice to have at least one of my senses fixed.

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#145

Honestly, that was part of my argument to the surgeon for moving forward early. I said I was already without one sense, don’t want to be without two. Made sense to him.