New concepts of CI rehabilitation

After cochlear implantation, hearing rehabilitation is required to enhance speech comprehension. With regard to the increasing number of patients, especially adults, beside face-to-face rehabilitation in a specialized center new concepts of auditory rehabilitation has to be ruled out in the future. Supported by the European Union and the state NRW a new teletherapeutic hearing platform for adult CI users ("train2hear") has been developed in an interdisciplinary team. This platform contains an initial analysis based on the ICF as well as various adaptive mechanisms which allow an automated adjustment of the difficulty to the individual learning progress of the user.

A total of 20 postlingual CI adults aged from 26 to 85 years (Ø60,6) and a mean CI experience of 10.1 months (3-22) participated in a pilot study in the ENT clinic of the RUB Bochum from August to October 2019. Before and after a 3-week lasting intervention, speech comprehension in quiet was tested using the Freiburger speech test (numbers and words) and in noise by using the HSM test (SNR: -10dB). In addition, communicative skills were determined by speech tracking. Questionnaires relying on usability and the participant’s self-perception were included as well.

The usability of the program was rated to be positive (86.3%) with regard to the System Usability Scale. The tracking rate increased from 34.8 to 40.1 words per minute. The HSM showed an average increase in sentence comprehension in noise from 30% to 39%.

Digital training programs could be a possible alternative for hearing rehabilitation after cochlear implantation in the future. However, long-term studies with larger patient populations are required.

Europäischen Union und dem Land NRW

Poster-PDF A-1233.PDF

Publication History

Article published online:
10 June 2020