Related Experiment Video
Updated: Jul 17, 2026
Neuro-rehabilitation Approach for Sudden Sensorineural Hearing Loss
Published on: January 25, 2016
A Within-Subject Comparison of Hearing Preservation Outcomes for Bilateral Cochlear Implant Recipients
Michael W Canfarotta1, Aaron C Moberly1, Ankita Patro1
1Department of Otolaryngology-Head and Neck Surgery Vanderbilt University Medical Center, Nashville, TN.
Objective:
To compare hearing preservation (HP) outcomes between ears for adult sequential bilateral cochlear implant (CI) recipients.
Study Design:
Within-subject, retrospective cohort.
Setting:
Tertiary referral CI center.
Patients:
Sixty adults with preoperative functional acoustic hearing [low-frequency pure-tone average (LFPTA; 125, 250, and 500 Hz) ≤80 dB HL] were implanted with the same electrode array in both ears.
Interventions:
Sequential bilateral cochlear implantation from 2012 to 2022.
Main Outcome Measures:
Initial (1 mo) and long-term (12 mo) HP outcomes between ears were assessed by comparing the LFPTA shift in the first and second implanted ear.
Results:
Correlations between LFPTA shift in the first and second implanted ear at 1 month ( rs = 0.221, P = 0.090) and 12 months ( rs = 0.234, P = 0.123) were weak and nonsignificant. However, a multilevel linear mixed-effects model demonstrated greater LFPTA shifts in the second implanted ear when compared with the first, with a mean difference of 6.3 dB HL (95% CI: 0.2-12.4, P = 0.048). In addition, the model showed that HP declined during the first 12 months following implantation, and younger patients had greater LFPTA shifts over time ( p interaction = 0.012). There were no significant associations between LFPTA shift and preoperative LFPTA, biological sex, electrode array design, or postoperative steroid use.
Conclusions:
In the present sample, HP in the first implanted ear was poorly predictive of the outcome in the second ear. Substantial variability in outcomes between ears could indicate that subtle differences in surgical technique and insertion dynamics have a relatively larger impact on HP than patient-specific factors.
