Bilateral cochlear implantation & NICE

Nowadays the vast majority of severe to profoundly deaf children are offered bilateral cochlear implants (one implant in each ear), but this has not always been the case. In January, 2009 NICE published the following guidance which led to the availability of bilateral implants for children:

NICE Guidance

Cochlear implants for children and adults with severe to profound deafness (published January, 2009)
http://www.nice.org.uk/guidance/ta166

The CICS Group was proud to be appointed as a consultee to the NICE Technical Appraisal of cochlear implants, and the Trustees are delighted that the evidence that CICS provided contributed to NICE’s decision to recommend (as an option for people with severe to profound deafness who do not receive adequate benefit from acoustic hearing aids) unilateral implantation for all adults, simultaneous bilateral cochlear implantation for children and sequential bilateral implantation for children who already had one cochlear implant at the date of the announcement of the Guidance.

CICS was also pleased to have been involved in campaigning for the criteria to be relaxed, which resulted in TA566 (published in March 2019). The CICS Group hopes that the criteria will be relaxed still further so that CIs will be available for children with single-sided deafness and that bilateral CIs will be routinely available for adults who need them.

Please click here for more information on TA566.