Question: A 20 year old male is evaluated for bilateral hearing loss. He uses American Sign Language to communicate with some oral sounds. Audiogram shows thresholds of 70 dB at 500 Hz, 95 dB at 1000 Hz, and no detectable hearing in the frequency range above that. He is interested in cochlear implantation. Which of the following best characterizes his anticipated outcome?

a) No sound awareness at all given the duration of deafness

b) Sound awareness, auditory cues for lip reading

c) Closed-set speech understanding

d) Open-set speech understanding similar to a typical CI recipient

[Answer will be posted with next week's new question]

Answer to last week's question, “Spit it Out” (December 6, 2021)

C - Sialoendoscopy.