Jamie’s family understood how important early intervention was for their child’s hearing health, so when they discovered he was a candidate for cochlear implants, they moved quickly. To learn about his progress read below:
“Hi, my name is Debora. I am originally from Brazil, living in the USA and married to an amazing American husband for over 13 years. Our first baby boy, Jake expanded our family and in 2021 we became a family of 4 when Jamie was born.
Jamie was born with severe to profound bilateral sensorineural hearing loss. We found out about his hearing loss during a routine newborn hearing screening. A month later we confirmed the diagnosis with an auditory brainstem response (ABR) test.
We were honestly devastated. There is no history of hearing loss in either mine or my husband’s family. However, we were supported by the most amazing team of doctors from our local hearing health care facility in South Carolina. We are thankful for the guidance we received from our ear, nose and throat (ENT) doctor and audiologist, along with our Auditory Verbal Therapist (AVT)-speech pathologist. We are also supported by the South Carolina School for the Deaf and Blind and an amazing family trainer.
Jamie’s hearing journey started when he was fitted for hearing aids, shortly after he turned 3-months-old. Although the hearing aids were allowing him access to sounds, they were not enough to put him inside of the ‘speech banana,’ a region in which all the phonemes of the world’s languages are represented on an audiogram.
A surprise for our family – the gift of hearing
It was later determined by an MRI that Jamie was a candidate for cochlear implants. My husband and I then started our research about cochlear implants. We had never heard about them before Jamie was born! Learning that there was a device that would provide our son with the gift of hearing was an amazing surprise! We come from a hearing world, and we hoped Jamie someday would be able to be part of it.
We have always known that there is nothing wrong with being deaf. If cochlear implants weren’t an option, we had no doubts Jamie would thrive and grow up to achieve amazing things as a deaf person. As a matter of fact, cochlear implants offer people the opportunity of hearing but they are not a cure for deafness. The moment the sound processors are off, Jamie is 100 percent deaf. So even though our family’s main goal for Jamie is verbal communication, we are also learning American Sign Language (ASL) and learning more about the deaf community.
We asked our team of doctors about all the brands available and we were told Cochlear is the most chosen brand by parents of young children because of all the accessories available, wireless connectivity and personalized services. Then we learned about the Nucleus® Smart App1 and all its functionalities, such as: monitoring the status of the sound processors and receiving notifications about disconnections; keeping track of how much speech our son is exposed to with the hearing tracker monitoring; Find My Processor feature; changing programs and volume, wireless streaming options and much more.
After we decided to choose Cochlear we found a group of parents of children with cochlear implants on social media. We asked if parents could share their experiences with Cochlear and their devices and the responses couldn’t have been more positive. Those parents were not only satisfied with the technology Cochlear offers but also with their customer service and retention solutions!
Jamie’s journey to cochlear implants
We made our final decision by choosing the Nucleus 7 Sound Processor. Jamie’s first cochlear implant surgery was in 2022 and shortly after the surgery, his sound processor was activated in his right ear, at 12 months old2
. It was later that year that Jamie became bilaterally implanted.
On the day of the device’s activation we received from Cochlear, a big backpack with many accessories and all the information we needed to understand more about Jamie’s cochlear implants and how to take care of them. Out of all the accessories available our favorite ones are the Mini Mic and the Aqua+ kit3.
Jamie was not a fan of wearing his hearing aids over his ears so we knew retention would be important with his new sound processors. Cochlear offered us every single retention solution available! We were able to experiment with everything: the Hugfits™, the Snugfits, a headband and the Koala Clips with different lengths of coils. We knew how very important it was to have Jamie wear his sound processors as often as possible, so we needed to figure out the best retention tool for Jamie. His preferred option has been the headband.
And yes, just like the parents we met during this journey said, Cochlear’s customer service is incredible! Having a toddler wear such an important device comes with the need for immediate assistance at times. Jamie’s hands are busy and love to explore things, but they are not always gentle handling his sound processors. Every single time we needed assistance from Cochlear we spoke with the most knowledgeable and friendly staff ever! It makes us feel like they really care for their customers and patients and want everyone to be able hear without interruptions!
One year after Jamie’s first implant activation we couldn’t be happier with the decision of implanting him with a Cochlear device! Our son is hearing! How amazing is that?!
Practice makes perfect!
We know we chose the best technology available for him by choosing Cochlear and we have been guided by an experienced team of doctors, which also made a difference. If I can offer parents a piece of advice when starting their children’s hearing journey, it is that cochlear implants are an amazing technology but they are not a magical button that turns hearing on instantly. Dedication to the process, a solid AVT-speech therapy foundation and keeping up with all audiology appointments are the key for our children’s success.
Also, the rule in our family is to talk, talk and talk! The more exposure Jamie has to speech the more likely to reproduce it he will be.
Early intervention was also a very important step in the hearing journey. We decided to not wait and see what would happen if Jamie continued with just a little bit of access to sounds by wearing hearing aids. We knew they weren’t enough for him to achieve speech. Our family’s main goal has been spoken language so we decided to implant Jamie as soon as we could. We had the opportunity to remove a lifetime of obstacles by giving him the gift of hearing. Non-implanted individuals can have a wonderful life, and we know there will be extra challenges and responsibilities for all implanted individuals, but things could be more difficult in a world without hearing.
By choosing to implant Jamie, we gave him choices and opened his life to many opportunities! Now he lives the best of both worlds: he hears when his implants are on and he can have a break and enjoy silence whenever he feels like turning off his devices.
Jamie most likely would never be able to talk if it wasn’t for this amazing technology called cochlear implants! Getting him implanted at 12 months old** was the best decision my husband and I could ever make for him. The difference between his initial audiogram (born with severe to profound hearing loss), his aided audiogram (still in the severe-profound range) and his audiogram now that he is implanted, is amazing! Jamie is hearing in the 20-30 dB range! What a great improvement!
Seeing how much Jamie loves hearing is one of the most amazing experiences I have ever had!
At the point of this blog, Jamie has been implanted for one year and nine months. He knows over 200 words and can put 5+ phrases together. In his most recent speech evaluation, Jamie was evaluated for expressive language, and he scored above his age category, reaching three years and two months old when evaluated for receptive language!
He sings all day long and he loves trying to have conversations with us. He repeats pretty much everything we ask him to say and he is able to use words meaningfully!
We are extremely proud of Jamie and we will be forever grateful to Cochlear for allowing him to achieve the gift of hearing!
We are also thankful to Cochlear for allowing us the opportunity of sharing Jamie’s story. To celebrate Jamie’s first hearing anniversary, I made a video of him saying all the words he has learned so far. I hope everyone enjoys it!”
Early intervention can benefit your child’s overall hearing health. Cochlear implants may be a solution that can help; learn about this technology here.
- Nucleus Smart App is available on App Store and Google Play. For compatibility information, visit www.Cochlear.com/compatibility.
- In the U.S., the cochlear implant system is intended for use in children 9 to 24 months of age who have bilateral profound sensorineural deafness and demonstrate limited benefit from appropriate binaural hearing aids. Children two years of age or older may demonstrate severe to profound hearing loss bilaterally.
In Canada, the Cochlear Nucleus Implant System (CI500 and CI600 Series) is approved for use in children 9 to 24 months of age who have profound sensorineural hearing loss in both ears and demonstrate limited benefit from appropriate hearing aids. Children 2 years of age or older may demonstrate severe to profound hearing loss in both ears.
- The Nucleus 7 Sound Processor with Aqua+ is water resistant to level IP68 of the International Standard IEC60529. This water protection means that the sound processor with the Aqua+ can be continuously submerged under water to a depth of 3 meters (9 ft and 9 in) for up to 2 hours. This water protection only applies when you use a Cochlear Standard Rechargeable Battery Module or Cochlear Compact Rechargeable Battery Module. The Nucleus 7 Sound Processor is water-resistant to level IP57 of the International Standard IEC60529 without the Aqua+ accessory for the Nucleus 7 Sound Processor.
