NICE guidance
Viewpoints
Dr Jo White
Lecturer in Speech and Hearing Sciences, Queen Margaret University, Edinburgh
For decades it has been unthinkable for a hearing impaired child to be fitted with only one hearing aid if he/she has the potential to benefit from two. The fact that so few children have been fitted with bilateral cochlear implants has increasingly been the result of a lack of resources rather than any doubt about the potential clinical benefits for the child.
Bilateral cochlear implantation provides a means of addressing many of the limitations associated with the use of a single cochlear implant, including difficulty localising sounds and problems hearing speech in background noise. Perhaps most importantly, the body of evidence supporting the use of simultaneous bilateral implants as a means of promoting auditory brain development in very young children continues to grow. I am delighted that NICE has chosen to recognise this in its new guidance for the provision of cochlear implants.
