Evaluation of speech perception in noise in cochlear implanted adults

Aim: to evaluate the effects of different signal-to-noise ratios on speech recognition obtained by the use of cochlear implant (CI); to compare the speech recognition in noise with different types of multichannel cochlear implants (CIs) and to evaluate the degree of difficulty for speech understanding in noise in daily life situations. Study design: cohort transversal. Material and Method: Forty adults with post-lingual hearing loss implanted with Nucleus 22, Nucleus 24, Combi 40, Combi 40+ and Clarion. We evaluated the recognition for CPA sentences in quiet and in S/N +15, +10 and +5 dB. We also applied the Social Hearing Handicap Index (SHHI) questionnaire for self-assessment in daily life. Results and Conclusion: All the implanted adults presented a significant reduction in the scores for sentences recognition as the S/N decreased. The medians´ curve for sentence recognition reached 50% in the signal-to-noise ratio of +10 dB. There was no statistically significant difference in sentences’ recognition scores and difficulty scores obtained with the SHHI, for all types of implants. The difficulties of implanted adults were rare in quiet and occasional in noisy situations according to SHHI questionnaire.