26 Aug 2011
By: SALMA KHALIK
THE Sound Of Silence is a great song, but for people who have lost their hearing, it is a frustrating daily reality.
Until Madam Liao Jin Qi, 60, had a Cochlear implant surgically placed in her skull three months ago, she was totally deaf in her right ear, and needed a hearing aid in her left.
But repeated infections in her left ear caused a discharge, which often made it impossible for her to wear the aid. She dropped out of conversations at home. Her son said she rarely spoke, and if there was to be a conversation, they had to send phone text messages to each other.
Watching television became a business of reading the subtitles – or turning up the volume so high it irritated everyone else at home.
Madam Liao, a hairstylist, was thankful that her clients had accepted that she wasn’t going to be chatty.
But she felt life passing her by.
Convinced by her son to have the implant done, she said: “I want my life to have quality. You only live once. It’s very stressful when you can’t hear. I want to know what’s happening. Otherwise, I’m waiting to die, and just eat and sleep.”
Getting the implant, also called a “bionic ear”, is not cheap. Her bill came to $39,000, with the implant alone costing $33,000; after medical insurance and a government subsidy for being a C-class patient, she was only $2,000 out of pocket.
Those assessed as suitable for Cochlear implants have a device planted in the bone of their skull, behind the “bad” ear. A month later, when the area is healed, an external device the size of a cellphone earpiece is hooked on to facilitate hearing.
The less severely deaf have two cheaper alternatives – the middle-ear implant at $13,000 and the bone-anchored hearing aid, or baha, at $7,000.
The baha was enough for operations manager Low Jee Keik, 49, who awoke one morning last year completely deaf in one ear. Only then did he realise how important it was to have two functioning ears. He said: “At meetings, I couldn’t hear when someone to my left spoke. I had to turn around to look at them to hear what they said.”
With the baha implant, his hearing is “90 per cent” the way it was before.
Ear, nose and throat specialist Yuen Heng Wai of Changi General Hospital (CGH), who treated Mr Low and Madam Liao, explained that people with single- sided hearing loss cannot tell where sounds are coming from. They miss a lot of conversation, and may stress their good ear straining to hear.
Dr Yuen said: “People without a hearing problem find it hard to understand those who suffer from it.”
Often, their families end up ignoring them because it becomes such a chore to have to raise one’s voice or say something several times.
Hearing-impaired people thus become frustrated, depressed and embarrassed; afraid of asking people to repeat themselves, they will most often just nod as if they understand what was said.
Dr Yuen said he does not know whether ignorance, embarrassment or the cost – or some combination of these factors – stop those with hearing problems from seeking help.
Not all such people need an implant. Their problem may just be a matter of removing ear wax or undergoing a minor operation to make stiff hearing bones mobile again, or getting fitted with hearing aids, he said.
And if they do need an implant or a hearing aid, they should view it the same way people with poor eyesight view wearing spectacles, he said.
Cochlear implants now also come with funky designs.
Associate Professor Lynne Lim, a senior consultant at the National University Hospital (NUH), said in the elderly, implants are done only when well-fitting and very powerful hearing aids have failed to provide benefit.
The Singapore General Hospital, CGH and NUH each do under 10 implants in adults a year. In the United States, more than 40,000 adults have ear implants.
Email: salma@sph.com.sg
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