Officially Approved!

So today was my appointment at UC Irvine with the Audiologist for my CI evaluation. UCI is 3 hours away, so each appt will be an all-day event! It was raining, foggy and just generally yuck the whole way there and back but God had his hand on us :) First she did a pure tone test with my hearing aid in. Came in and checked my hearing aid with a modified stethoscope, changed the battery, then did the test again. Then she did a test I've never had done. She put a sensor thing in my ear. It had a cord running from there to a hand-held device I held. It tested something and gave me a 2.0 for my left ear and a 4.0 for my right ear. Whatever that means, she didn't tell me lol. It wasn't the ear drum pressure test, my ENT requested she skip that due to my ear drum repair less than 2 weeks ago. Then she did a speech test with my hearing aid in. These were pre-recorded sentences. I didn't hear any of the words let alone understand them. She came back in the booth after a few minutes to confirm I wasn't hearing anything and my response was "I didn't know you had started." Ha! She finished the test and then had me do a pure-tone test without my hearing aid, and then a bone conduction test. Finally she took me out and did a live speech test with my aid in. She asked me questions with her mouth covered, waited for a response, and then asked again with her mouth un-covered. This was with her less than 2 feet away from me. I got no words correct with her mouth covered. I got "eggs" but it was actually "legs." I also got the vowels out of two words (oo and ay). I got all of the questions with her mouth un-covered since I'm a speech-reading Ninja like that lol! Then we were done with the testing! She informed me that I was a great candidate! She complimented my coping skills and said they will be of great benefit to me during the 3-6 weeks between surgery and activation, and also in learning to hear with the CI in general. She went through the process prior to surgery, risks of the surgery, expectations following activation, follow-ups for re-mapping (changing the program on the CI as my brain learns), etc. She indicated that my right ear will be implanted, as my left ear has been "dead" for 16 years now and has never been aided. She made us an appointment with the surgeon for February 7. He will take a look at my MRI and CT. The Audi doesn't think there are any repair options for my ears, but he will confirm or deny that at the appt. In lieu of repair surgery, we will proceed with the CI! She told us it is usually one month from insurance approval for surgery to happen. Regardless I have to wait until Spring break or Summer break so I don't miss too much school! She gave me an information packet on Med-El (I already have packets from Cochlear and Advanced Bionics) so that I can start thinking about which CI company I want to go with. I'll have an appt with her to go over it all before deciding. As of now I'm leaning towards AB. I don't know if my insurance has any restrictions on the companies, so we'll have to see about that as well. From everything I've read you get to decide which one you want barring any physical defects of the cochlea that would require you to go with a certain company's electrode. I'll make a post soon comparing the 3 companies' implants and processors. As we checked out she let me know I would need a Meningitis vaccine prior to surgery and that the surgeon would give me the order for it. This is because there's an increased risk of Bacterial Menengitis following the CI surgery.

We were very happy with our experience at UCI! A gazillion times better than at the last clinic! We love the Audiologist, she is so awesome! I'll have a minimum of 6 appt's with her in the next year and a half, so that's important! Now we just wait until our appt with the surgeon!

Feeling incredibly blessed today!

We made it!

 Cool pic of the LA mountains on the way home.