CLINICAL REPORT ON SPEECH PRODUCTION OF COCHLEAR IMPLANT USERS

Objective: The aim was to assess articulation and speech intelligibili ty over time in a group of cochlear implant users implanted at 8 yr or over. The hypothesis was that the postoperative speech production per formance would be greater than the preoperative performance. Design: A test of intelligibility using sentences and an articulation test meas uring non-imitative elicited speech were administered to 11 and 10 sub jects, respectively, who were implanted with the 22-electrode cochlear implant. Nine subjects received both tests. Age at implantation range d from 8 yr to 20 yr and implant use ranged from 1 yr to 4 yr 5 mo. Re sults: For both the intelligibility and articulation tests roughly hal f of the subjects showed significant improvements over time and group mean postoperative performance significantly exceeded preoperative per formance. Improvements occurred for front, middle, and back consonants ; for stops, fricatives, and glides and for voiceless and voiced conso nants. Conclusions: Despite being deprived of acoustic speech informat ion for many childhood years, roughly half of the patients assessed sh owed significant gains in speech intelligibility and articulation post implantation. The lack of a control group of non-implanted patients me ans that we cannot separate out the influence of the implant on speech production from other influences such as training and tactile-kinaest hetic feedback.