Chance's audiological results..

Chance had an audiological appintment last week where he was tested to see how well he was hearing with both implants on. And then how well he was doing with just the right one on and then just the left.

Chance is amazingly patient as he sits in the soundproof booth throwing cars into a bucket each time he hears a beep. Chance is doing realy well. To liven things up, the audiologist gave Chance a ramp he could set on his lap so he could make the cars jump off into the bucket. He enjoyed that immensely.

One test called the HINT which stands for "hearing in noise test", was administered. The funny thing is, there was no noise, Chance just listened to hear what he could hear. You can do the test with back ground noises going on, but that would have taken an extra 2 hours and as it was, Chance had been listening for 2 hours already. So, we decided to divide up the next appointment into 2 sessions. One day we will do the HINT test with noise, and one day we'll do just the regular tests. Our next appiontment will be in April if all continues to go well with Chance's implant program.

Chance's last test was in August and he scored 73% in his right ear, and 72% in his left ear. With both, he got 74%. Now, he is scoring 87% with the right implant, 87% with the left, and 91% together. So he continues to hear even better than before.

One of the other tests, is the CNC word test where random words are spoken by a taped voice. This is harder than listening to a live voice. In August he scored 50% with his right ear, 56% with his left ear, and 54% with both together. Now he is scoring 62% in his right ear, 68% in his left ear, and 80% together. He has made signifcant progress in his ability to correctly catch what word is said since August. Even hearing adults have a harder time on this test because there is no context, just random words.

The last test is the CNC phrases. This test is a bit easier than the single word test because in a phrase, you can guess what is said by figuring out what makes sense with the other words in the phrase. In August, Chance scored 77% in his right ear, 79% in his left and 83% with both implants together. Now he is scoring 81% in his right ear, 82% in his left ear, and 91% with both implants together.

If there is any question still as to whether having two implants really makes a difference, I think the tests show that Chance is getting a great benefit from having two. Even if the precentages are small on some of the tests, hearing just a bit more, means that you are able to understand more at school, lets you know more about what is going on on the playground, and makes it so that you don't have to focus so hard when hearing.

Theses tests are based on adult responses not child responses. That means that the percentages are put together by what adults score on these tests. Adults who usually have a much greater language base than a child does. Adults are better at guessing what is said too, since they have more of a language base to fall back on when something doesn't sound quite right. Adutls average score on some of these tests is about 75%. Chance, is scoring better than adults with a larger langage base and much more experience.

On the word test, adults are at a disadvantage though, as are older kids. By a certain age, when adutls or older children hear something and it doesn't make sense, they won't give an answer when asked what they thought they heard. They don't want to look stupid. Chance is young enough that if he thinks he hears the word "ping" he'll report that he heard the word "ping", even though it doesn't make sense. This way an audiologist can see that Chance is hearing the ending sound of the word "thing" but not the first. It gives a better assessent of what is being heard.

Chance is scoring quite a bit better than adults do on some of these tests which is phenominal considering that he has a much shallower language base to rely on. He is blowing us away with his progress and we know that he is getting divine help with his hearing as well.