The aim of this review was to investigate the effectiveness of music therapy and auditory verbal therapy (AVT) in the development of auditory skills in children and adolescents with cochlear implants (CI). The search was conducted by using the PRISMA method in five databases. The evidence shows that intervention with music and AVT can improve aspects of language, including speech perception, development of pre-verbal skills, receptive and expressive vocabulary, prosodic and social skills. These effects of music therapy are mainly concentrated on the phonetic-phonological, semantic, and pragmatic components of language, whereas auditory verbal therapy showed benefits in all language components evaluated, due to the systematic use of the auditory channel to stimulate verbal development. Both strategies promote greater family involvement and an intervention focused on the patient’s natural context, which improves long-term outcomes. The need for future research with more rigorous designs to validate the effects of the interventions is highlighted. Music therapy and AVT are promising approaches to support language development in children and adolescents with cochlear implants, and their combined use may enhance their benefits from an early stage. 

Daniela Bautista Vivas is a fourth-year undergraduate student in Speech and Language Therapy and Medicine student at the National University of Colombia, in Bogotá, D.C., being a member of the research group “Paradigms in Speech and Language Therapy” and is the author of the article “Literary review. Music therapy and auditory verbal therapy: therapeutic effectiveness in cochlear implantation”, published in the Journal of Otorhinolaryngology and Head and Neck Surgery of the Chilean Society of Otorhinolaryngology, Medicine and Head and Neck Surgery.