So we have the surgery date confirmed, subject to Alice not contracting any nasties over the next three weeks. We sat down with David Selvadurai yesterday for a good hour discussing thoughts on the way forward.

David has suggested that Alice is a good candidate for bilateral implantation, but his thoughts are that, on the off chance that her ANSD does improve over the next 9-12 months, that we do these sequentially rather than simultaneously to preserve the one good ear for as long as possible.

That said there are pros to having them both done at the same time.

So the choice is really in our hands. Given the new NICE guidelines, as Alice has been approved funding for one CI, they (so far as I am aware) will have to fund a second and, if truth be known, would probably rather they be done simultaneously as there is a cost benefit to this.

However, there is the thought of the surgery being five hours rather than two and a half with the complications this might bring, together with the complexities of settling Alice with two CIs when, as mentioned in previous posts, she has become terrified of her ears being played with and rarely wears her aids these days. David tried to check in Alice’s ears yesterday and witnessed how sensitive she has become at first hand – she was having none of it!

I don’t think there is a right or wrong answer to this. Mind you, it is still us who have to make the decision.

It’s not like having surgery for a life threatening illness – ‘do this or you’ll die’. Having a CI at all is a choice complicated by the further choice of one or two? Simultaneously or sequentially?

I’m buggered if I know the answer – what would you do?