I just finished making a vlog about my son David’s CI activation and mapping, done in American Sign Language (you can view it at the bottom of this posting), and now I am writing this posting, in English, as a transcript for my vlog… That way, people whose native language is ASL could view my vlog while people fluent in English could read my posting, so that they would not miss anything.
The experience has been interesting for me, to observe David undergoing the cochlear implantation, recovery, activation, and mapping. Three weeks ago, he had a minor surgical procedure which he had the magnet planted against his skull and electrodes in his cochlea, leaving a small scar right behind his ear. Three weeks later, this past Thursday, we woke up early in the morning for a 30-minute drive to the hospital. We waited for several minutes and three audiologists came to us and took us to the therapy room. David sat next to the desk where the computer was, with three audiologists seated before desk, ready to observe him and to take notes, and an interpreter sat next to me.
The audiologist handed the CI device to David for him to put on. He had a few seconds of confusion of locating the magnet and when attached, the audiologist started the program. She tested to see if all electrodes (22 electrodes) worked, no circuit shorts, etc. They worked beautifully. David was not hearing anything at the moment. Then he was told he’d be hearing “beep”s as the audiologist tested each electrode to see if he responded to each. He raised his hand as he heard the beep… he responded to all electrodes, which meant all electrodes were fully inserted in his cochlea.
Then the next step was to have David to respond and to inform when the “beep” from each electrode got a bit loud for the audiologist to establish the maximum comfort and threshold levels. It went for about an hour, which was a little boring for him… enough for him to become fidgety in the chair. The reason for the slowly establishing the threshold/maximum comfort levels is to prevent to overload the brain when the CI is activated. That was the initial mapping.
He was told to get ready for the activation and he said yup. She turned it on and at first he heard nothing. Then she turned the volume up a bit… he heard little. She turned it up more and then he reacted, by laughing shortly and claiming it was weird. He heard us talking… we sounded like cars honking and geese honking to his brain. We were told to expect the sounds to sound robotic or Donald Duffy’s voice. Then the audiologists showed us the box containing the twinkles and bells of the CI device (another processor intended to be used as back up, hooks, etc.) Of course, David was fascinated with the box’s goods. No, he did not show any discomfort nor pain; he acted it was cool, different. To observe his reaction (around the minute 2), you could observe the URL link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H_wJ5VbqUg4
Then I drove him to school where he spent the rest of the day there with his CI on. He came home and he immediately noticed that his sister had a high-pitched voice and that his father was a loud talker and it caused discomfort to him. I suggested to him that he took the device off and he refused, preferring to leave it on. OK.
The next day, we went back to the hospital, again, for the 2nd day of mapping, now that he had spent a full day wearing the CI device, giving his brain a chance to process the sound waves. When his CI was activated, his brain interpreted the sound waves as sensations… the feelings/vibrations, so to speak. His brain quickly interpreted the sensations into the levels of loudness, which became consonants. The audiologists said that he quickly distinguished “s”, “sh”, “b”, and “m” so far, due to his being born with normal hearing. So it’s more like for him to learn to ride a bike all over again after not riding it for years. He had to sit through the 2nd mapping which was very much like the initial mapping… responding to “beep”s, etc. The goal of mapping is to get him used to the increasing range of loudness (high and soft sounds) of each electrodes (pitches.) He still hears people’s speech as car honking though. He quickly came to appreciate music more with CI now, but he winces at the singing because it sounds like… car honking, and he’d rather listen to music without songs.
He will start the auditory therapy next Monday at school for 3 x a week, to train his brain to interpret that honk is short “i”, that honk is long “a”, so forth. But so far, it has been a very good, positive start for him. He told me that he wanted to get another CI next year. Good, just wait until we get everything settled before he could proceed to another CI 
)
Obviously, CI benefits hard of hearing people, late deafened people (like David), and the babies who’d have to receive therapy (AVT) upon receiving the cochlear implantation. David has shown no pain, no discomfort, no headache, no nausea so far, since the activation and the mappings. The whole experience has been positive and I really appreciate it.
I just finished making a vlog about my son David’s CI activation and mapping, done in American Sign Language (you can view it at the bottom of this posting), and now I am writing this posting, in English, as a transcript for my vlog… That way, people whose native language is ASL could view my vlog while people fluent in English could read my posting, so that they would not miss anything.
The experience has been interesting for me, to observe David undergoing the cochlear implantation, recovery, activation, and mapping. Three weeks ago, he had a minor surgical procedure which he had the magnet planted against his skull and electrodes in his cochlea, leaving a small scar right behind his ear. Three weeks later, this past Thursday, we woke up early in the morning for a 30-minute drive to the hospital. We waited for several minutes and three audiologists came to us and took us to the therapy room. David sat next to the desk where the computer was, with three audiologists seated before desk, ready to observe him and to take notes, and an interpreter sat next to me.
The audiologist handed the CI device to David for him to put on. He had a few seconds of confusion of locating the magnet and when attached, the audiologist started the program. She tested to see if all electrodes (22 electrodes) worked, no circuit shorts, etc. They worked beautifully. David was not hearing anything at the moment. Then he was told he’d be hearing “beep”s as the audiologist tested each electrode to see if he responded to each. He raised his hand as he heard the beep… he responded to all electrodes, which meant all electrodes were fully inserted in his cochlea.
Then the next step was to have David to respond and to inform when the “beep” from each electrode got a bit loud for the audiologist to establish the maximum comfort and threshold levels. It went for about an hour, which was a little boring for him… enough for him to become fidgety in the chair. The reason for the slowly establishing the threshold/maximum comfort levels is to prevent to overload the brain when the CI is activated. That was the initial mapping.
He was told to get ready for the activation and he said yup. She turned it on and at first he heard nothing. Then she turned the volume up a bit… he heard little. She turned it up more and then he reacted, by laughing shortly and claiming it was weird. He heard us talking… we sounded like cars honking and geese honking to his brain. We were told to expect the sounds to sound robotic or Donald Duffy’s voice. Then the audiologists showed us the box containing the twinkles and bells of the CI device (another processor intended to be used as back up, hooks, etc.) Of course, David was fascinated with the box’s goods. No, he did not show any discomfort nor pain; he acted it was cool, different. To observe his reaction (around the minute 2), you could observe the URL link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H_wJ5VbqUg4
Then I drove him to school where he spent the rest of the day there with his CI on. He came home and he immediately noticed that his sister had a high-pitched voice and that his father was a loud talker and it caused discomfort to him. I suggested to him that he took the device off and he refused, preferring to leave it on. OK.
The next day, we went back to the hospital, again, for the 2nd day of mapping, now that he had spent a full day wearing the CI device, giving his brain a chance to process the sound waves. When his CI was activated, his brain interpreted the sound waves as sensations… the feelings/vibrations, so to speak. His brain quickly interpreted the sensations into the levels of loudness, which became consonants. The audiologists said that he quickly distinguished “s”, “sh”, “b”, and “m” so far, due to his being born with normal hearing. So it’s more like for him to learn to ride a bike all over again after not riding it for years. He had to sit through the 2nd mapping which was very much like the initial mapping… responding to “beep”s, etc. The goal of mapping is to get him used to the increasing range of loudness (high and soft sounds) of each electrodes (pitches.) He still hears people’s speech as car honking though. He quickly came to appreciate music more with CI now, but he winces at the singing because it sounds like… car honking, and he’d rather listen to music without songs.
He will start the auditory therapy next Monday at school for 3 x a week, to train his brain to interpret that honk is short “i”, that honk is long “a”, so forth. But so far, it has been a very good, positive start for him. He told me that he wanted to get another CI next year. Good, just wait until we get everything settled before he could proceed to another CI )
Obviously, CI benefits hard of hearing people, late deafened people (like David), and the babies who’d have to receive therapy (AVT) upon receiving the cochlear implantation. David has shown no pain, no discomfort, no headache, no nausea so far, since the activation and the mappings. The whole experience has been positive and I really appreciate it.
Tags: eab
