First experiences with bone conduction implant Sophono

Abstract

ntroduction: Bone conduction implants are currently used for rehabilitation of conductive and mixed hearing loss as well as for single sided deafness. A growing number of these implants available on the market increases requirements on detailed knowledge on their technical properties, and on their advantages and disadvantages in clinical practice. Sophono is one of the recent members in this implant group. The aim of the study is to summarize our first experiences with Sophono at our implantation center in Bratislava. Patients and methods: We present data of the first two adult patients who underwent Sophono implantation. Both suffered from bilateral conductive hearing loss of different etiology. We focused on their audiological functional outcomes, basic surgical aspects and subjective assessment by the patients. Results: In free field tone audiometry with the implant, both patients achieved improvement of hearing thresholds by 21.25 dB and 31.25 dB, respectively. In speech tests with and without noise, we also demonstrated a clear benefit of the implant, which was in a narrow relationship with the degrees of their hearing loss: speech discrimination scores in noise were 30% and 60% in patients 1 and 2, respectively. The surgical procedure in Sophono implantation is relatively simple and does not include any work on middle ear structures. Patient satisfaction with the implant does not always correspond to the measured functional outcomes. Conclusion: The Sophono implant represents a suitable option for rehabilitation of conductive and mixed hearing loss as well as single sided deafness in selected patients. The candidate selection is always based on comprehensive assessment in which the audiological results are an elementary criterion, but definitely not a single one. Keywords: Sophono – implantation – conductive hearing loss