Abstract:
The field of pediatric cochlear implantation has changed tremendously since the early 1980s when single-channel cochlear implants were first provided to postlingually deafened children in the United States. Although implantation in children was at first restricted to older children with postlingually acquired hearing loss, it is now common for prelingually deafened children as young as two years of age to receive a cochlear implant. Furthermore, the introduction of multichannel cochlear implants and improved signal processing strategies have resulted in far greater speech perception benefits than originally thought possible. This presentation will review the major developments in pediatric implantation and summarize the results to date. [Work supported by NIDCD Grant Nos. DC00064 and DC00423.]