Kudos to Mark Drolsbaugh on a More Tolerant & Compassionate View of Cochlear Implants

Dear Editor,

I would like to congratulate Mark Drolsbaugh for having the courage for taking a stand that is highly unpopular in the Deaf community: a more tolerant and compassionate view of young deaf children with cochlear implants and their parents.

Mr. Drolsbaugh perfectly describes the dilemma faced by Deaf profession also working with parents in regard to cochlear implants, and my situation is almost identical to his.

I am an administrator for a “Deaf-centered” organization that provides support to families with young deaf children in British Columbia, and, while I am personally not in favor of implanting young deaf children, I must bite my tongue (or finger) whenever one of our families decide to implant their deaf child. I cannot help but show compassion to those families who already had their deaf children implanted but later come to us for support and help.

In most cases, these parents did not have access to full information which they should have had when making the decision to implant their children and cannot be held fully responsible.

The Deaf community should be directing its energies towards medical and health professionals in ensuring that they fulfill their ethical obligation to provide FULL information to parents in an impartial manner so that parents are able to make a FULLY INFORMED decision on whether to proceed with the procedure or not.

The Deaf community’s continuing negative reaction toward cochlear implants in young deaf children, while understandable, is counter-productive and only serves to alienate these children and their parents from the Deaf community. It plays right into the hands of the enemies of the Deaf community who use this negative reaction to “prove” their point that the Deaf community was always out to “steal””young deaf children away from their parents.

There is emerging research that young deaf children who were exposed to sign language prior to being implanted tend to perform better with their implants than those implanted children who were not similarly exposed.

The reason for this is simple: these children were able to gain a language foothold prior to being implanted. For those who were not exposed, there is a crucial language gap that can go on for as long as two years before being implanted.

The bottom line is this – parents who decide to implant their deaf children and opt for the sign language option prior to the implant will always continue to have positive attitudes towards sign language and the Deaf community.

The Deaf community should be working with them instead of against them; these children will eventually become a part of the Deaf community one day and work hard to advance its cause, and if their implants make it easier for them to do so, then by all means we should support them.

The key is for the Deaf community take OWNERSHIP of cochlear implants.

Rather than rejecting implants outright, they can make them work within the framework of Deaf culture. Right now, oralists have seized ownership of this issue and are exploiting it as much as possible to advance their cause. The Deaf community, despite its deep misgivings, must attempt to wrest the implant issue from the oralists’ grip if it is to have any future at all. Cochlear implants, whether we like it or not are here to stay, and we must learn to accommodate them. Otherwise, the Deaf community will be like the proverbial deer frozen in the glare of the light of a runaway train.

Sincerely, Roger J. Carver, Deaf Children’s Society of B.C.