Interim assessment of candidates for cochlear implants.
The Minimal Auditory Capabilities battery was administered to patients with profound postlingual sensorineural hearing loss to obtain interim audiometric indices on the relative benefits of cochlear implants and hearing aids. One group used a cochlear implant comprising a multielectrode array and a single-channel stimulator, another group wore hearing aids, with only borderline satisfaction, and the third group wore hearing aids to good advantage. Scores for the latter group were consistently higher than the borderline group on two prosodic tests, but the borderline group scored better on closed-set spondee and vowel recognition tests. Scores were essentially the same for the two groups on the remaining tests. Tentative criteria induces were applied to members of the borderline group in terms of the hearing improvement that might be anticipated from an implant.
D000328:Adult; D001302:Audiometry, Speech; D003054:Cochlear Implants; D003638:Deafness / Q000534:rehabilitation*; D005069:Evaluation Studies as Topic; D006319:Hearing Loss, Sensorineural / Q000534:rehabilitation*; D006320:Hearing Tests; D006801:Humans; D008875:Middle Aged