The Cochlear Story

Cochlear Ltd, together with its university partner and many other collaborators, has returned hearing to over 160 000 people thanks to the development of its hearing implant. This book documents the human story behind that development. It delves into the commercial planning and implementation that led to the product’s success in an international, highly competitive market, and the human drama that was experienced in achieving it. Chapters are structured around the development of the science. Woven within that structure are the personal and business stories that have enabled successful outcomes in the relatively new age of biomedical engineering. The Cochlear Story aims to put this Australian development on the world map in recognition of Australian medicine, science, technology and business. New from CSIRO PUBLISHING, the Bright Ideas series explores the innovation, application and continuing impact of major scientific inventions throughout history. From the compass to the bionic ear, each book will provide a fascinating and accessible story on a single invention that has changed our everyday lives.

A giant of medical science tells the story of the invention of the bionic ear. After seeing his father struggle with deafness, Graeme Clark overcame obstacles and opposition to bring the gift of hearing to profoundly deaf children and adults.

Kylie Gets a Cochlear Implant is the heartwarming story of a little girl who loses her hearing and is heartbroken about the things she believes she can no longer do. Kylie loves to dance, but fears that without hearing the music, she won't be able to feel the beat or the rhythm. She is very sad until she hears about a way to overcome her hearing loss. See what happens when Kylie undergoes a cochlear implant, which is a surgically implanted device that can help her hear sound and music. In fact, cochlear implants can be so successful that they are often called bionic ears! Written by a teacher who works with deaf children, this story shows insight into what these brave children face. Marilyn C. Rose finished her Ph.D. at the same time she was writing this book. A graduate of Hunter College and the NYU Graduate School of Education, she is a public school teacher of the deaf and hard of hearing in New York City. She grew up in the Bronx and now lives with her husband, Marc, in Bayside, New York. "I have three grown wonderful sons and my family is the light of my life!" This is her first book. Publisher's website: http: //sbpra.com/MarilynCRose

Nine families share their experiences of how they made the decision to have their child undergo a cochlear implant.

Evidence suggests that medical innovation is becoming increasingly dependent on interdisciplinary research and on the crossing of institutional boundaries. This volume focuses on the conditions governing the supply of new medical technologies and suggest that the boundaries between disciplines, institutions, and the private and public sectors have been redrawn and reshaped. Individual essays explore the nature, organization, and management of interdisciplinary R&D in medicine; the introduction into clinical practice of the laser, endoscopic innovations, cochlear implantation, cardiovascular imaging technologies, and synthetic insulin; the division of innovating labor in biotechnology; the government- industry-university interface; perspectives on industrial R&D management; and the growing intertwining of the public and proprietary in medical technology.

The cochlear implant is a device that bypasses a nonfunctional inner ear and stimulates the auditory nerve directly. Written by the "father" of the multi-electrode implant, this comprehensive text and reference gives an account of the principles underlying cochlear implants and their clinical application. For the clinician, the book will provide guidance in the treatment of patients; for the engineer and researcher it will provide the background for further research; and for the student, it will provide a through understanding of the subject.

Cochlear implants continue to change the lives of children and adults with severe or profound hearing loss. This book explains, in a simple and accessible style, the manner in which cochlear implants work, for whom they work, and the extent to which they help deaf people hear. The author tells the story of her own experience with the implant procedure, along with its advantages and benefits. Comprehensively explaining the basic concept, history, and evolution of cochlear implants, the book includes questionnaire responses, case studies, and general information--all provided by foremost clinicians in the field--that provide a full picture of how implant recipients and their families feel about the procedure.

When it was first developed, the cochlear implant was hailed as a "miracle cure" for deafness. That relatively few deaf adults seemed to want it was puzzling. The technology was then modified for use with deaf children, 90 percent of whom have hearing parents. Then, controversy struck as the Deaf community overwhelmingly protested the use of the device and procedure. For them, the cochlear implant was not viewed in the context of medical progress and advances in the physiology of hearing, but instead represented the historic oppression of deaf people and of sign languages. Part ethnography and part historical study, The Artificial Ear is based on interviews with researchers who were pivotal in the early development and implementation of the new technology. Through an analysis of the scientific and clinical literature, Stuart Blume reconstructs the history of artificial hearing from its conceptual origins in the 1930s, to the first attempt at cochlear implantation in Paris in the 1950s, and to the widespread clinical application of the "bionic ear" since the 1980s.