A common cause of vision failure is cataracts, a clouding of the eye's normally clear lens most people develop as they age. Many cases can be managed with glasses or contact lenses, but some people choose lens replacement to help restore clear vision. With this procedure, a surgeon removes the lens and replaces it with a plastic disc called an intraocular lens. In many cases, the operation can be performed under local anesthesia and you can often go home that same day. For thousands of people with severe to profound hearing loss, even the most powerful hearing aids provide little benefit, since hearing aids merely amplify sound.
Cochlear implants bypass the non-working parts of the ear altogether.
They work by picking up sound through a microphone, converting this sound to electrical signals through a small processor worn behind the ear or carried on the body, and sending the electrical signals directly to the auditory nerve via electrodes implanted in the cochlea. The earliest cochlear implants allowed people to detect some environmental sounds, such as car horns. Doctors can now replace knees, hips, shoulders and elbows in people whose joints have worn out from aging or overuse. For many people, joint pain limits their mobility, disrupts their sleep and makes even exiting a car painful. Now, surgery can help.