Introduction
Approximately one out of every thousand children is born with hearing loss (Bush, Burton, Loan, & Shinn, 2013). Since newborn babies are unable to communicate with the people around, this problem is difficult to diagnose and can be easily overlooked. A delay or failure of a diagnosis can cause significant complications for the child in the future and lead to problems with social, cognitive development and language (Bush et al., 2013). As a result, academic performance and socialization of a child will be negatively impacted by the absence of timely intervention. The babies who are diagnosed early start to receive hearing aids and quickly learn to function productively, so their hearing loss does not have as much influence on their development. The children who become the victims of failed or delayed diagnoses and start to experience problems with communication skills and education are given an alternative intervention – cochlear implants.
Besides, the congenial hearing loss may be unilateral and bilateral. In the latter case, the children are given binaural cochlear implants (inserted on both sides), but often this solution does not help as much as it is believed to due to the lack of coordination between the two implants (Gordon, Deighton, Abbasalipour, & Papsin, 2014). The types of implantations, the way the devices work, and the learning progress of the children may seriously affect their sensitivity which results in a number of different effects some of which are negative (Guo, McGregor, & Spencer, 2015). As language comprehension and acquisition are the main problems for the children with hearing loss, the possible interventions may include the pursuit of oral speech acquisition or the sign language introduction, in many cases the parents of deaf children may choose both interventions at the same time (Fitzpatrick, Stevens, Garritty, & Moher, 2013).
Since hearing loss is a very serious problem that affects such crucial aspects of a child’s life as learning, perception, and communication, many children with hearing loss end up having the consequential developmental and learning disabilities (Corrales & Oghalai, 2013). That way, the time when the cochlear implants are given to a child determines their further development and possible problems; the researchers find that the earlier the children are diagnosed and aided, the easier it becomes for them to develop adequately and learn in regular schools together with their peers who do not suffer from hearing loss (Geers & Nicholas, 2013). The optimal time for intervention and the ways to address the problems children may experience due to delayed intervention is an important subject to address for the contemporary scientists because the timeliness of the diagnosis and implantation define whether the patients are going to remain disabled and limited for the rest of their lives or be able to function normally in the modern society.
Literature Review
Time
In children born with hearing loss, the timing of diagnosis and aid is vital to secure their future wellbeing on social and cognitive levels. The article called “Timing Discrepancies of Early Intervention Hearing Services in Urban and Rural Cochlear Implant Recipients” written by Bush, Burton, Loan, and Shinn (2013) has timing of implantation as the main focus. The results are measured and evaluated by means of a comparison of the patients dwelling and rural and urban areas. The analysis of the two sample groups of implant recipients finds that the children from rural areas that are located further away from the hospitals and medical centers end up aided later than those from the cities. As a result, the negative developmental effects are more frequent in the rural patients.
The study by Geers and Nicholas (2013) called “Enduring Advantages of Early Cochlear Implantation for Spoken Language Development” explored the same issue but from the perspective of the spoken language outcomes. The research analyzed a sample of sixty children with hearing loss evaluating their spoken language skills and vocabulary and correlating it with the time they were implanted. The authors found that the children who received their implants earlier had much better spoken language scores (Geers & Nicholas, 2013). As for the other group of patients, their language skills remained limited even after the addition of the second implant.
The study by Dunn et al. (2014) called “Longitudinal Speech Perception and Language Performance in Pediatric Cochlear Implant Users: the Effect of Age at Implantation” evaluated the language performance in two samples of children who received their cochlear implants before 2 and between 2 and 4 years of age. The author measured the children’s development up to adolescence and concluded that the results of both groups event up over time which means that an intervention provided during the first 4 years of a child’s life give the patients good chances to develop normally.
Perception
The studies by Gordon, Deighton, Abbasalipou, and Papsin (2014) and by Guo, McGregor, and Spencer (2015) focus on the issues of hearing sensitivity of the children with cochlear implants. The authors of “Perception of Binaural Cues Develops in Children Who Are Deaf through Bilateral Cochlear Implantation” interviewed a sample of 79 patients and found that when the implants are provided in different time, the children have problems with binaural hearing that are do not only disrupt their learning and development but also endanger the children as they are unable to receive the information from the world around properly (Gordon et al., 2014). The authors of the other article studied the archives with data about the improvements of 36 children implanted bilaterally and unilaterally before 2 years old and determined that regardless of all the inconsistencies with binaural hearing the children with bilateral implants learn new words better as they are able to pick up more information from the world around (Guo et al., 2015). As the practical data demonstrates the more children are able to perceive, the faster they learn and develop.
Development
The study by Fitzpatrick et al. (2013) called “The effects of sign language on spoken language acquisition in children with hearing loss: a systematic review protocol” reviews multiple articles concerning the interventions for the deaf children targeting the acquisition of spoken language. The authors find that more research and information from the knowledge users is required to provide the parents of the deaf infants with the necessary information and help them make the decisions concerning the preferred intervention techniques.
The study called “Cochlear implant considerations in children with additional disabilities” by Corrales and Oghalai (2013) is a literature review with focuses on a sample of works exploring the developmental disabilities frequently found in children with hearing loss. The authors of this article explain that due to the loss of hearing the infants cannot develop as fast as their hearing peers. As a result, deaf infants end up having slower development of cognitive skills, communication abilities, adaptation to the outer world, and motor skills. The study presents the results of other works that confirm the importance of the early intervention for the children born with unilateral or bilateral hearing loss due to its tight connection with a variety of other skills and abilities necessary for the normal development or even survival of a child. This article and its conclusions and implications can serve as the work that sums up the findings of the six studies reviewed above as it demonstrates the potential outcomes that are likely to appear if the children suffering from hearing loss do not receive a timely intervention.
Conclusion
The contemporary scholars are aware of the high rates of congenial hearing loss in infants. There is a series of interventions for this issue. Due to the timely diagnosis and widespread screening practices this disability is detected and addressed very early. The time when cochlear implants are provided to the children is crucial to their future development. A late diagnosis may result in more disabilities and delayed development. The scholars do not know the most suitable interventions for the future adaptation of the children; the choices are sign language and spoken language. More research is needed to collect information on this subject. The proposed research will target the parents of the infants who are already using sign and spoken language as final goals and their insight on what is best for the development of a child.
Reference List
Bush, M. L., Burton, M., Loan, A., & Shinn, J. B. (2013). Timing Discrepancies of Early Intervention Hearing Services in Urban and Rural Cochlear Implant Recipients. Otol Neurotol., 34(9), 1-12.
Corrales, C., & Oghalai, J. (2013). Cochlear Implant Considerations in Children with Additional Disabilities. Curr Otorhinolaryngol Rep, 1(2), 61-68.
Dunn, C., Walker, E., Oleson, J., Kenworthy, M., Van Voorst, T., & Tomblin, J.,… Gantz, B. J. (2014). Longitudinal Speech Perception and Language Performance in Pediatric Cochlear Implant Users. Ear And Hearing, 35(2), 148-160.
Fitzpatrick, E., Stevens, A., Garritty, C., & Moher, D. (2013). The effects of sign language on spoken language acquisition in children with hearing loss: a systematic review protocol. Systematic Reviews, 2(1), 108.
Geers, A., & Nicholas, J. (2013). Enduring Advantages of Early Cochlear Implantation for Spoken Language Development. J Speech Lang Hear Res, 56(2), 643.
Gordon, K., Deighton, M., Abbasalipour, P., & Papsin, B. (2014). Perception of Binaural Cues Develops in Children Who Are Deaf through Bilateral Cochlear Implantation. Plos ONE, 9(12), 1-25.
Guo, L., McGregor, K., & Spencer, L. (2015). Are Young Children With Cochlear Implants Sensitive to the Statistics of Words in the Ambient Spoken Language? J Speech Lang Hear Res, 58(3), 987.