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Cuba has highest number of children with electronic
hearing implants
THE application in Cuba of
minimum-access surgery for cochlear implants has
enabled 53 children – 18 deaf-mutes and 35 deaf – to
have partial hearing, providing them with a means of
communication that empowers their development and
improves their quality of life.
This important achievement,
unprecedented in Cuba, was announced May 10 during
the evening session of the 1st International
Conference on Community Genetics, which lasted until
the early hours of May 11, in the presence of
President Fidel Castro.
Experts noted that this is the
largest group of deaf-mute children with implants in
the world, putting Cuba in an outstanding position
in the development of these extremely costly
techniques, which use highly complex procedures.
The cochlear implant is an
electronic device, scientifically proven, that acts
as a substitute in the ear’s receptor organ for what
is damaged in most people who are deaf.
This procedure uses parts that
are placed via surgery inside the ear and includes
an external component, a sort of microcomputer that
captures sound from the environment and translates
it into electronic impulses near the auditory nerve.
The first experiments with this
type of device began in 1957, and stimulated the
cochlea (where the auditory receptor is located),
but it was not until 1985 that these implants were
approved for the first time for adults with profound
hearing loss, those who could hear almost nothing.
Currently, cochlear implants are
used for “nerve deafness” (neurosensory) and also
when the ear’s receptor is damaged bilaterally,
severely or totally. These are patients who cannot
benefit from conventional hearing aids, which are
sound amplifiers that solve hearing problems for the
majority of deaf patients.
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