What is a cochlear implant? Strictly star Tasha Ghouri’s hearing device explained --[Reported by Umva mag]

Tasha Ghouri has well and truly won the hearts of the nation with her gorgeous performances on Strictly Come Dancing 2024.

Partnered with Aljaž Škorjanec, 34, the former Love Island contestant, 26, has topped the leaderboard and left viewers in tears with her emotional performances.

Alongside delivering top-quality routines each week, the reality star makes history as Strictly’s first-ever contestant with a cochlear implant. She’s the second Deaf contestant following Rose Ayling-Ellis, who lifted the glitterball in 2021.

Many will have seen the dancer’s cochlear implant many times before, as she even went viral before rising to fame when it was visible in her ASOS modelling campaign.

But what is a cochlear implant, and how does it work?

What is a cochlear implant?

A cochlear implant is an electronic device that can help with hearing.

According to the Royal National Institute for Deaf People (RNID), cochlear implants ‘provide a sensation of hearing to those who have severe to profound deafness’.

RNID explains: ‘Instead of making the sound louder, like a hearing aid, implants use electrical signals to directly stimulate the auditory nerve (the nerve that carries sound from the cochlea to the brain).’

Part of the device sits on the outside of the ear, while another part is surgically implanted underneath the skin.

The internal part involves placing electrodes on the cochlea, while the external part has a microphone and a transmitter coil.

But what’s the cochlea? It is a hollow bone in the inner ear, shaped like a spiral. It is an important factor in the sense of hearing, as it is filled with fluid and picks up vibrations.

The vibrations are picked up by countless hair cells in the cochlea, which translate them into electrical signals, which are then transmitted to nerve cells, the auditory nerve, and the brain.

The implant seems to somewhat replicate this process. The microphone picks up sound, which becomes electrical signals, transmitted by radio waves to the electrodes on the cochlea. The electrodes are able to send a tiny electrical current to the auditory nerve.

How does Tasha Ghouri use her cochlear implant on Strictly?

Tasha has shared a video with her fans to educate them on the inner workings of her cochlear implant after being inundated with questions.

She begins by stating that hearing aids and cochlear implants are two completely different things.

A hearing aid is a three-part sound system that amplifies sounds, while a cochlear implant is surgically done and is much more advanced. A cochlear implant is for people who are fully deaf or have very little hearing left.

‘I was born completely deaf in both ears, so hearing aids did not benefit me whatsoever, so I had to go down the cochlear implant route,’ she shares.

Tasha proceeds to explain that she hears through her implant as the surgery didn’t ‘fix’ her ears, so she cannot hear through them.

Her implant has a microphone at the front where sound travels. Wrapping around the ear, the implant also has a transmitter, which attaches to her head.

‘As soon as the metal attaches to the coil inside, that activates the cochlear implant.

‘The signals trigger the cochlea nerve and the nerve sends the signals to the brain and that’s how it’s recognised as sound.

‘These sounds sound like natural hearing, but they’re not exactly the same. I will never know what a normal hearing person transmits sounds like.’

Tasha adds: ‘There are different types of cochlear implants. You can have cochlear implants that are just a magnet, some of them are higher (on the head), some people have two (one on each ear); mine are rechargeable batteries.’

She charges her implant overnight and doesn’t sleep with it in.

Tasha also points out that her voice changes when she doesn’t have her implant in. This is because she’s unable to hear herself, making her sound more monotone when she’s unable to hear her own pitch or volume.

She proceeds to explain how people’s voices sound to hear, comparing them with how they are to a normal hearing person.

‘It kind of has that robotic tone to it. But what’s special about a cochlear implant is that when you go to an audiologist, they can tune it. They plug the cochlear implant into a computer and they tune the pitching, the tone if it’s too loud, and they balance it out.

‘There are times when people are talking behind me, I don’t know if they’re talking to me. If you’re on my left side as well… that’s why, on Strictly, everyone is more on my right, so I can hear them better.

‘When it comes to music, I hear it by feeling the music. When there are loud drums or bass, I can really feel that in my body.’

Tasha only has one cochlear implant, despite the opportunity to have a second earlier on in life. However, she didn’t want to go through the surgery of having it attached when she was happy enough already.

The influencer admits there are some downsides to having a cochlear implant, which includes concentration fatigue due to lip reading all day, background noises, and sensory overload. She also gets frequent headaches due to the strong magnet.

Can anyone use a cochlear implant?

Cochlear implants aren’t an option for every person who is hard of hearing or deaf.

According to the NHS, other types of hearing implants are available, depending on the reason for deafness, including auditory brainstem implants and middle ear implants.

Not everyone who is deaf or hard of hearing will want an implant or an aid, with many preferring to communicate using British Sign Language (BSL) or another sign language.

Tasha was given a cochlear implant at age five. She’s previously shared that she has sensory loss, which means the small hairs in her cochlea were missing and damaged when she was born, for reasons unbeknownst to her.

Cochlear implants can take years and years to get used to, as well, but her brain has ‘adapted’ to it over time.

Strictly Come Dancing airs Saturdays and Sundays on BBC One and BBC iPlayer.

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