Quality of Life in Older Adults with Cochlear Implantation: Can It Be Equal to That of Healthy Older Adults?

Background and Objectives: This study aimed to evaluate the audiologic results after co-chlear implantation (CI) in older patients and the degree of improvement in their quality of life (QoL). Subjects and Methods: Patients over 65 years old who underwent CI at implant cen-ter in Bozyaka Training and Research Hospital were included in this study (n=54; 34 males and 20 females). The control group was patient over 65 years old with normal hearing (n=54; 34 males and 20 females). We administered three questionnaires [World Health Or-ganization Quality of Life-BREF (WHOQOL-BREF), World Health Organization Quality of Life-OLD (WHOQOL-OLD)], and Geriatric Depression Scale (GDS) to evaluate the QoL, CI-related effects on activities of daily life, and social activities in all the subjects. Moreover, cor-relations between speech recognition and the QoL scores were evaluated. The duration of implant use and comorbidities were also examined as potential factors affecting QoL. Re-sults: The patients had remarkable improvements (the mean score of postoperative speech perception 75.7%) in speech perception after CI. The scores for the WHOQOL-OLD and WHOQOL-BREF questionnaire responses were similar in both the study and control groups, except those for a two subdomains (social relations and social participation). The patients with longer-term CI had higher scores than those with short-term CI use. In general, the chang-es in GDS scores were not significant (p<0.05). Conclusions: The treatment of hearing loss with CI conferred significant improvement in patient's QoL (p<0.01). The evaluation of QoL can provide multidimensional insights into a geriatric patient's progress and, therefore, should be considered by audiologists.

Automated summary

The study found that cochlear implantation can significantly improve speech perception in patients over 65 years old and have a positive impact on quality of life. Patients with longer-term CI use showed better quality of life scores.