PhD Scientific Days 2023

Clinical Medicine - Posters I

Assessment of cognitive function before cochlear implantation

Text of the abstract

Introduction
In recent years, cochlear implants have become a routinely used and proven effective treatment for severe to profound hearing loss. In our clinic, an implant team, working according to the principle of interdisciplinarity, decides on the expected effectiveness of the use of cochlear implantation for rehabilitation. Of the criteria considered by the implant team, cognitive function is of particular importance, and severe damage to this function may be a contraindication to implantation. In order to objectively assess this, our clinic introduces pre-implantation testing.
Aims:
Our aim is to describe the preliminary assessment of cognitive function through a detailed case report of two patients referred for cochlear implantation. We describe the test results of the two patients, showing the diagnostic process that led to different therapeutic conclusions (in one case cochlear implantation was performed successfully, in the other case, this rehabilitation plan was discarded) based on two similar anamneses (both patients have history of central lesion).
Methods:
We used Trail Making Test (TMT) to assess attention and mental flexibility and the Mini-Mental State Examination (MMSE) test to measure the severity of dementia. Both patients performed the Verbal Fluency Test from the Addenbrooke's Cognitive Examination-III (ACE-III). The Beck Depression Inventory (BDI) was used to screen depression and to control the potential by-effect of depression on cognitive functioning (i.e. depressive pseudodementia).
Results:
The patient from the first case study achieved almost perfect results in all four of the test examinations. In the second case the TMT, MMSE and ACE-III-s Verbal Fluency Test showed decreased performance, especially in attention functions and memory. The patient was not able to perform the BDI.
Conclusions:
In the two case reports we demonstrate the importance of objectifiable assessment of cognitive function prior to cochlear implantation.

E-mail address: konde14@gmail.com
Semmelweis University, Department of Otolaryngology and Head and Neck Surgery, Károly Rácz Graduate School of Clinical Medicine
Supervisor: Dr. Gáborján Anita, PhD, Assistant Professor