Specialist surgeons have successfully performed cochlear implant surgery on children with profound hearing loss at Jowako Specialist Hospital, Kaduna.
The surgery was led by Prof. Mohammed Garba Mainasara, a consultant ENT (Ear, Nose and Throat) and head and neck surgeon, alongside Prof. Ahmed Mahanna, an otology and cochlear implantation expert from the Alexandria School of Medicine.
Speaking after the surgery, Prof. Mainasara explained that cochlear implantation is a surgical procedure carried out on patients with complete hearing loss and can be done on babies as young as one year or on adults who lost their hearing due to sickness or drugs.
He explained that the procedure involves placing a device that directly stimulates the auditory nerve to provide sound to the brain, bypassing damaged parts of the ear.
“Early detection is very important. We have started newborn hearing screening at Jowako Hospital so that if any abnormality is detected, we can plan for implant early,” he said.
Prof. Mahanna, who pioneered cochlear implant surgery in Kaduna in 2020, said the device transforms lives.
“Some patients who were born deaf now attend normal schools and have become professionals after successful implantation. Today is the start of a long journey to be followed by speech and auditory rehabilitation. These children can return to be normal like their peers,” he said.
He noted that the device used, Medical Electronics (MED-EL) from Austria, is expensive and mostly paid for by patients in Nigeria.
He called on the federal government to subsidise the cost as is done in countries like Tanzania and India.
“Some African countries pay for the device. The Nigerian government can do the same so that we surgeons just implant it,” Prof. Mahanna said.
LEADERSHIP gathered that since 2020, more than 30 cochlear implant surgeries have been done in Kaduna by the same team.
Families of the patients also appealed to the government to subsidise the cost of the device, which they said was over N35 million.
