Pediatric Cochlear Implantation Learning and the Brain

Nancy M Young, MD
 is the Lillian S. Wells Professor of Pediatric Otolaryngology at the Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine. She is a surgeon and Head of the Section of Otology and Neurotology in the Division of Otolaryngology at the Ann & Robert H. Lurie Children’s Hospital of Chicago. She is also a Fellow of the Knowles Hearing Center of the Northwestern University School of Communication. Dr. Young is founder and Medical Director of the Lurie Children’s Pediatric Cochlear Implant Program, one of the largest in the United States. She is Principal Investigator of NIH funded research using brain scans and AI-analytics to predict language after cochlear implantation on the individual-child level. The goal of this research is to develop custom brain-based therapy to improve language outcomes.

Karen Iler Kirk, PhD
 is Professor Emerita in the Department of Speech and Hearing Science at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, where she served as the Shahid and Ann Carlson Khan Professor and Head. She has authored more than 100 publications. Her research investigating factors influencing spoken word recognition and speech perception in adult and pediatric cochlear implant users was continuously funded by NIH for two decades.  She has developed tests of spoken word recognition that are used widely to assess performance in pediatric cochlear implant candidates and recipients. Her tests have been adapted for use in other languages, including Mandarin and Cantonese. She is a Fellow of the American Speech-Language-Hearing Association and received Honors of the Association in 2017. The Honors of the Association recognizes members for their distinguished contributions to the discipline of communication sciences and disorders and is the highest honor the Association bestows.