Cochlear Implant Reliability: Reporting of Device Failures

Graham O'Neill; Neil S Tolley

doi:10.1007/s12070-020-01826-9

Cochlear Implant Reliability: Reporting of Device Failures

Indian J Otolaryngol Head Neck Surg. 2020 Sep;72(3):326-328. doi: 10.1007/s12070-020-01826-9. Epub 2020 Mar 7.

Authors

Graham O'Neill¹, Neil S Tolley¹

Affiliation

¹ Dept of Otolaryngology, Head and Neck Surgery, St Mary's Hospital, London, UK.

Abstract

The aim of this study was to investigate the adequacy of the reporting of cochlear implant device failures. Data from a parallel study involving over 6300 children [1] was used to calculate the instantaneous failure rate for explantations. We found that this is comparable to what manufacturers term 'Cumulative Failure Percentage' (CFP). This finding raises concerns about the information provided by manufacturers on the reliability of their implants.

Keywords: Cumulative failure percentage; Cumulative failure rate; Implanted device; Instantaneous failure rate; Reliability.