Posted on 12/20/2001 1:40:49 PM PST by Pokey78
House Ear Clinic/House Ear Institute Public Statement
LOS ANGELES, Dec. 20 /PRNewswire/ -- Antonio De la Cruz, M.D., of the House Ear Clinic/House Ear Institute in Los Angeles, performed Rush Limbaugh's cochlear implant surgery yesterday. Dr. De la Cruz and Jennifer Derebery, M.D., have been treating Mr. Limbaugh for hearing loss as a result of Auto- Immune Inner Ear Disease (AIED). After a period of treatment with medication in an effort to save his residual hearing, Mr. Limbaugh and his physicians decided to proceed with a cochlear implant to restore his hearing. Mr. Limbaugh was moving around easily after several hours of post-surgery bed rest at St. Vincent Medical Center yesterday, where Dr. De la Cruz performed his cochlear implant surgery as an outpatient.
"I feel great!" said Rush Limbaugh. "The surgery went smoothly and I'm looking forward to enjoying the holidays and returning to the air in early January."
"Mr. Limbaugh's cochlear implant surgery at the House Ear Clinic yesterday went very well," said Antonio De la Cruz, M.D., House Ear Clinic/House Ear Institute. "As we expected, Mr. Limbaugh responded very well to the surgery, which lasted about two hours, and he was sent home this morning. Rush has the approval of his physicians at the House Ear Clinic to return to work in early January."
"Mr. Limbaugh won't be ready to use his cochlear implant until a recovery period of several weeks is completed," said Antonio De la Cruz, M.D., House Ear Clinic/House Ear Institute. "Mr. Limbaugh will be able to work and resume his other activities during the post-surgery recovery period while his incision is healing."
Rush Limbaugh will return to the House Ear Clinic in a few weeks to be fitted with the external unit for his cochlear implant. At the Clinic, Mr. Limbaugh's cochlear implant use will be activated in an initial stimulation and mapping session with his audiologist. He will hear sound for the first time since he lost his residual hearing.
"This cochlear implant will reconnect Mr. Limbaugh to his environment, and that is an important benefit to his quality of life," said Antonio De la Cruz, M.D., House Ear Clinic/House Ear Institute.
Two components make up the external unit worn behind the ear by cochlear implant users -- a microphone, which receives environmental sounds and transmits them to a speech processor, where mechanical sounds are then converted into a processed electrical signal. This processed signal is sent to the brain via the implanted electrodes within the inner ear. The quality of sound received through a cochlear implant is different from the quality of sound processed through a natural ear, but with time and training, most implant users learn to converse easily.
Yes, aren't libs the compassionate ones. Did you hear that lib from Los Angleless today on Rush's program? He was either calling the callers idiots, or cutting them off. Who was that guy and how in the name of goodness did he ever get on Rush's show!? Paleeze!
Anyway, tomorrow we go into the Christmas weekend with Walter Williams, always a good show and heavy on lessons on LIBERTY! and what it is. We have become so socialized in this country that someone like Dr. Williams sounds radical when in reality, he is probably left of most of the founders.
Anyway, God Bless you Rush, Godspeed, Merry Christmas!
Harold Dean Miller, a Mennonite writer, travels around the country with his family, giving talks about Christian music, and performing concerts at churches. Several of the children have cochlear implants, and the family sings beautifully. Since it is four-part acappella singing, I would think they can hear music well enough.
PTL for the successful surgery.
I'll second the PTL.
Just reporting what Rush himself said about his future potential for hearing music.
The one big thing that has impressed me is that with all Rush has gone through -- with all the uncertainity he faced, with all the disappointments, he always maintained a disposition that was remarkable. I know that he is an optimist, but his cheerful nature during all this heartache impressed me. I've always had the deepest respect for him, but this whole episode, and how he reacted to it publicly, has raised him even higher. IMNSHO.
Good luck, Rish, with the rest of it.
My sister adjusted quite nicely to a CI (as she calls her Cochlear Implant).
It took a bit for her to get 'used' to the sound - and they tried several different algorithms in the external 'processor' (DSP) pre-processes any signals that are magnetically coupled through the skin to the actual implant that contacts the actual nerve endings that used to carry sound from her ears into her brain.
I think she described the sound she first heard as a bit of a buzzing sound at first - imagine Peter Frampton and his 'talking' guitar ...
She can now carry on normal conversations, talk on the phone - she is practically normal now!
Carol - bless your tin-foil wrapped heart, but, the next big FAD is SOC - System On a Chip. (VLSI still requires outside support and interface circuitry to perform. SOC incorpoartes EVERYTHING except the battery and antenna on the 'chip')
Memorize this *new* buzzword, do web searches on it and move into this century (VLSI is old hat) ...
Wow, that amazing! Hope it goes well.
Yes she did -
- she had a family and three kids plus hubby when her hearing finally faded to zero ...
But, thanks to this miracle - she is active again now!
Part of her hearing problem seemed to stem from childhood - and it grew progrssively worse over the years.
On one ear/one side the nerves did not seem to be suitable for an implant - but the other side was still good!
I remember story she relates about the first time she heard birds with her CI - she couldn't tell if her 'processor' was acting up or not (she hadn't heard birds due to her diminished hearing loss for probably ten years!).
The only drawback is - she is now reliant on a supply of AA batteries for her hearing. A set of rechargeables are good for about 1 waking-day ... AA alkalines slightly longer ...
My sister spent a lot of time time making trips back for adjustments in the 'processor' algorithm - and of course the university doctors were VERY interested in her progress so there were tests each week too!
I think that it took some getting used to, so there is a re-training of the brain that takes place. The big benefit was that she already had years of speech behind her - so it was more a matter of adapting there re-learing everything.
She found several support groups that deal with this sort of thing too ...
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.