Club for cochlear implantees inaugurated

CHENNAI: A club to exclusively handle the post-operative needs of cochlear implantees was inaugurated at the Rajiv Gandhi Government General Hospital on Wednesday. The club, part of the upgraded Institute of Otorhinolaryngology of the hospital, will train parents and implantees with monthly reviews to completely rehabilitate those who earlier suffered from hearing impairment.“There are at least one million hearing impaired people in the country. In the USA, one in 10 such people gets a cochlear implant done, but here, the figures are very low. This is because an implant costs at least ` Eight lakh which remains unaffordable to many,” noted Dr V Palani, GH medical superintendent. In the government hospital, 10 cochlear implants have been done by the ENT department so far, with the state government bearing the implant, surgery and post-operative costs. “There are 125 persons now awaiting the implant in the hospital,” said Dr A Muraleedharan, chief ENT surgeon at the hospital. These implants are being handed over free under a state government programme, which caters to those below the age of five.“Tamil Nadu and Andhra Pradesh are the only two states in the country to sponsor a cochlear implant programme,” noted Dr Mohan Kameshwaran, MD of Madras ENT Research Foundation, who guides these surgeries conducted at the GH.