Practical Efforts in Expanding Access to Cochlear Implantation (AMW)
2021 AAO-HNSF Annual Meeting & OTO Experience
Disabling hearing loss affects >465 million globally, and while hearing aids are appropriate for most, cochlear implants (CI) have become the gold standard for those patients with greater hearing impairment and lack of benefit from conventional amplification. Supported by the Otology/Neurotology Education Committee, our panel brings together a diverse group of established cochlear implant surgeons from varied practice settings, including tertiary private practice (Abraham Jacob), military (Samuel A. Spear), academic university practice (Jacob B. Hunter), and an integrated corporate health system (Darius Kohan) to discuss ongoing and future steps towards improving CI access. Local, regional, and national perspectives will be considered during a series of concise presentations on the following topics: 1. A summary of existing audiometric criteria for cochlear implantation in children/adults. 2. Expanding indications - decreased age at implantation, single sided deafness, asymmetrical hearing loss, the advanced elderly, those with residual hearing, fluctuating hearing loss & patients with unique anatomic considerations. 3. The role of objective and transparent hearing aid fittings - utilizing the Speech Perception Gap (observed difference between PBMax on audiometry and aided word recognition scores) to objectively identify poor hearing aid performers who might benefit from cochlear implantation. 4. Efforts to improve cochlear implant access for active-duty military and those in the Veterans Administration Healthcare System. 5. Highlighting racial/ethnic disparities in cochlear implantation. 6. Successfully establishing partnerships with community audiology practices for identifying cochlear implant candidates and activating/programming devices postoperatively.
Credits
CME:1.0, MOC:1.0