Minimum Reporting Standards for Adult Cochlear Implantation

Abstract

This article outlines new minimum standards for reporting adult cochlear implant outcomes. These standards have been endorsed by the Implantable Hearing Devices Committee and the Hearing Committee of the American Academy of Otolaryngology-Head and Neck Surgery. The lack of a standardized method for reporting outcomes following cochlear implantation in clinical trials has hampered the ability of investigators to draw comparisons across studies. Variability in data reported in articles and presentation formats inhibits meta-analyses, making it impossible to accumulate the large patient cohorts needed for statistically significant inference. While investigators remain unrestricted in publishing their adult cochlear implant outcome data in additional formats that they believe to be valuable, they should include the presently proposed minimal data set to facilitate interstudy comparability and consistency of reporting.

Keywords: adult; cochlear implantation; hearing preservation; outcomes; scientific reporting.

Figure 1.

Test matrix. This matrix should be used for the preoperative evaluation as well as for testing during all postoperative intervals. “Augmented” denotes hearing with either a hearing aid or a cochlear implant. AD, right ear; AS, left ear; AU, both ears or binaural condition; BKB-SIN, Bamford-Kowal-Bamford Speech-in-Noise; CI, cochlear implant; CNC, consonant-nucleus-consonant; HA, hearing aid.