P300 in Children with Early and Late Cochlear Implantation

Introduction: P300 shows the cortical electrophysiological activity which involved in attention, memory, discrimination, integration and decision making skills. T Therefore P300 is used for assessing the cortical function of the individual with hearing impairment. Aim and Need of the study: This present research is focused on objective assessment of P300 in early and late cochlear implantees. So the present study aimed on investigating the P300 in individuals with early and late cochlear implantation. Method: 30 participants were included in this study. All the 30 participants had undergone unilateral cochlear implantation. The selected participants were divided into two groups. The group I includes children who had undergone CI below the chronological age of 3.5 years and group II includes children who had undergone CI after the chronological age of 3.5 years. All the selected participants were recorded with P300 (endogenous potential) through loud speaker. This elicited a positive response in the latency region of 250msec to 400 msec. Results and discussion: The data on latency and amplitude were tabulated and analyzed using SPSS for Windows (Version 16.0). The data in terms of latency and amplitude of P300 in early and late cochlear implantees were analyzed using descriptive statistics (mean, Standard Deviation and range values of latency and amplitude).The group I and group II were compared using the inferential statistics i.e. the Independent sample t test was used, to find out the significant difference between the groups. The results revealed that latency of early and late implantees were statistically significant. Conclusion: To conclude the present study that hearing impairment during first few years of life can create a negative consequences for developing brain and if not stimulated on optimal period that can lead to reduce or poor performance, hence the younger the chronological age of implantation can lead to a better prognosis.