Knowledge about cochlear implantation: A parental perspective

Abstract

Objectives: Cochlear implantation (CI) is used for children with severe to profound hearing loss who show little or no improvement using hearing aids. This study explored parental knowledge of their children’s CI.Methods: A cross-sectional study involving the parents of 115 pediatric CI patients was conducted at King Abdullah Specialized Children’s Hospital in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. Parents were interviewed by telephone using a 50-question validated questionnaire.Results: Most parents of children with CI reported being comfortable in using the internet (68.7%) and social media (40.9%) to obtain information regarding CI. Although most parents of children with CI relied on health professionals and websites as their main sources of information, they were also able to obtain necessary information at meetings for CI patients and health professionals. Parents of children with CI felt they had sufficient information regarding the impact of hearing loss (78%) and CI (71%) on speech understanding and language development; however, they had insufficient information regarding criteria for CI candidacy, available brands of CI devices, and the advantages and disadvantages of each.Conclusion: Parents reported that health professionals were the ideal source of information regarding hearing loss and CI. Moreover, our study showed that parents should learn more about cochlear implant devices, the post-implantation process, and candidacy criteria.