Speech and language development after cochlear implantation in children with bony labyrinth malformations: long-term results

The aim of this study was to investigate speech and language development after long-term cochlear implantation in children with bony labyrinth malformations (BLMs) and to present the surgical findings in this group of patients. The auditory and linguistic skills of 21 children who had BLM were assessed in this study. They were implanted between 1998 and 2009. Twenty-two sex-matched and age-matched implantees without BLM were evaluated as the control group. To compare speech perception and speech intelligibility between the groups, the categories of auditory performance (CAP) test and speech intelligibility rating (SIR) test, respectively, were administered. The Turkish version of the Test of Early Language Development (TELD-3-T) was administered to evaluate and compare the linguistic skills of the groups. Surgical findings and complications were also analyzed. Implanted anomalies were common cavity in five patients, incomplete partition type 1 in 5 patients, and incomplete partition type 2 in 11 patients. The CAP and SIR scores were significantly higher in the control group (p < 0.05), but the TELD-3-T test scores were comparable among the groups (p > 0.05). Based on the specific type of malformation, the CAP and SIR scores were comparable between the subgroups (p > 0.05). No perioperative complications occurred in the control group. However, various perioperative complications (gusher, etc.) and surgical difficulty occurred in the anomaly group. The malformation group had unsatisfactory results with regard to speech perception skills; however, this group and the non-anomalous group exhibited comparable long-term results on linguistic development.