Functional Outcomes and Quality of Life after Cochlear Implantation in Patients with Long-Term Deafness

Background: Hearing-related quality of life (QoL) after cochlear implantation (CI) is as important as audiological performance. We evaluated the functional results and QoL after CI in a heterogeneous patient cohort with emphasis on patients with long-term deafness (>10 years). Methods: Twenty-eight patients (n = 32 implanted ears, within n = 12 long-term deaf ears) implanted with a mid-scala electrode array were included in this retrospective mono-centric cohort study. Speech intelligibility for monosyllables (SIM), speech reception thresholds (SRT50) and QoL with Nijmegen Cochlear Implant Questionnaire (NCIQ) were registered. Correlation of SIM and QoL was analyzed. Results: SIM and SRT50 improved significantly 12 months postoperatively up to 54.8 +/- 29.1% and 49.3 +/- 9.6 dB SPL, respectively. SIM progressively improved up to 1 year, but some early-deafened, late implanted patients developed speech understanding several years after implantation. The global and all subdomain QoL scores increased significantly up to 12 months postoperatively and we found a correlation of SIM and global QoL score at 12 months postoperatively. Several patients of the "poor performer" (SIM < 40%) group reported high improvement of hearing-related QoL. Conclusions: Cochlear implantation provides a benefit in hearing-related QoL, even in some patients with low postoperative speech intelligibility results. Consequently, hearing-related QoL scores should be routinely used as outcome measure beside standard speech understanding tests, as well. Further studies with a prospective multi-centric design are needed to identify factors influencing post-implantation functional results and QoL in the patient group of long-term deafness.