FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Contact: International Services Department - Ralph Foster, II, Manager, (210) 575-0165 or Kristian Mojica, 210-575-0164; 800-333-7333

SAN ANTONIO, TX – At two years old, Aldo Lopez Barrientos has never heard the sound of his mother’s voice. The family doctor examined him and told the family he would never be able to hear or talk – that they should begin learning sign language. Understandably, the hearing deficit affected his early development. But when Aldo finally spoke the long awaited, “Ma-ma,” his mother’s heart sung. It was a sure sign that the child’s vocal capabilities and language processing ability are in order. But still Aldo lives in a silent world, and misses out on the learning that comes through environmental sounds and the spoken word.

Aldo lives with his parents and little sister in Apodaca, Nuevo Leon, near Monterrey, where his mother teaches physical education classes in the suburban school. During a family outing to the shopping mall, a young boy started toward Aldo as he came down the aisle. The mothers shyly talked, then noticing an external device behind the other boy’s ear, Señora Barrientos asked whether that might be the child’s hearing aid. No, but it was part of a cochlear implant device. They compared notes. So many similarities!

Feeling hopeful, Sra. Barrientos began researching options to treat her son’s deafness. She searched the Internet. She talked with people. Finally she met Maria Elena Villarreal. As Director of San Antonio’s foreign trade office in Monterrey, N.L., known as Casa San Antonio, Villarreal knew of the vast medical resources available in San Antonio. Learning of Aldo’s hearing impairment, she quickly placed a toll free call to the International Services Department of Methodist Healthcare in San Antonio.

The International Services office is staffed 24 hours a day with bilingual physician referral specialists, whose job it is to make it easier for international patients to access health care resources at Methodist Healthcare facilities. On behalf of little Aldo, they contacted one of the physicians who specialize in cochlear implant surgery, neurotologist Brian Perry, MD. , with Ear Medical Group. Ear Medical Group specializes in diagnosis and treatment of hearing impairment, ear disease and balance disorders.

The doctor determined that Aldo is a good candidate for cochlear implant surgery. Performed for children and adults with severe to profound hearing loss, this therapeutic procedure literally has changed the lives of individuals with hearing loss too severe to be helped by hearing aids.

After receiving a cochlear implant, Aldo will learn to “hear” in this new way, with the help of speech therapy sessions back home in Mexico. His implant will be turned on for the first time on March 24, the day after his surgery, by an audiologist trained in cochlear implant technology. It will be a joyous day, to be sure, as the cacophony of noise is introduced to his environment, as well as the gentle words of his loving family.

Methodist Healthcare is San Antonio’s largest and most preferred health care provider with 23 facilities including seven acute care hospitals: Methodist Heart Hospital*, Methodist Children’s Hospital of South Texas*, Methodist Hospital, Methodist Specialty and Transplant Hospital*, Northeast Methodist Hospital*, Metropolitan Methodist Hospital* and Methodist Ambulatory Surgery Hospital--Northwest. * A Methodist Hospital facility.

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Note to Media: Interviews can be arranged with Aldo and his parents before and after surgery.

Backgrounder: Cochlear Implant Surgery

What is a cochlear implant? A small electronic processing device is implanted surgically and used with an externally-worn speech-processor that is programmed by an audiologist.

How does it work?

With the cochlear implant, the normal hearing process is broken down into several steps, so the brain can process it. First, electrodes are placed in the inner ear and connected to a receiver placed under the skin behind the patient’s ear.

This implant: (1) converts digital information into electrical signals

(2) sends signals down to the electrode array into the inner ear

(3) delivers the electrical signal through the electrodes to the auditory nerve

The auditory nerve carries the sound information to the brain, where it is interpreted as sound.

A microphone and a speech processor are worn on the outside, much like a regular hearing aid. The microphone collects sounds from the environment, then the processor converts the sounds into digital information which travels to the receiver. The signal is then sent to the electrodes within the cochlea and onto the auditory nerve. The brain then can interpret the sound as it does for normal hearing.

Who can benefit from a cochlear implant?

Results for children who are born deaf and implanted at an early age show speech and language abilities similar to children with normal hearing. Children and adults who originally had hearing and lost it do well with cochlear implants, as well. How well one hears with a cochlear implant depends on the cause of deafness, duration of deafness, use of amplification, motivation to hear and previous language experience, either through spoken or signed language. Each patient is different and must be evaluated to determine how successful a cochlear implant is likely to be.

Good candidates for a cochlear implant will have:

• A profound sensorineural hearing loss (nerve deafness) in both ears
• Lack of progress in the development of auditory skills with hearing aids
• High motivation and realistic expectations from the family
• Speech and language therapy
• No interfering medical conditions