Neuroprosthetic Hearing with Auditory Brainstem Implants / Wiederherstellung des Hörens durch auditorische Hirnstammimplantate

Abstract

The auditory brainstem implant (ABI) does provide auditory sensations, recognition of environmental sounds and aid in spoken communication in about 300 patients worldwide. It is no more an investigative device but widely accepted for the treatment of patients who have lost hearing due to bilateral tumors of the hearing nerve who transmits the acoustic information from the cochlea to the brain. Most of the implanted patients are completely deaf when the implant is switched off. In contrast to cochlear implants, only few of the implanted patients achieve open-set speech recognition without the help of visual cues. On average, the ABI improves communicative functions like speech recognition at about 30% when compared to lip-reading only. The task for the next years is to improve the outcome of ABI further by developing new less invasive operative approaches as well as new hardware and software for the ABI device.

Assessment of gliosis around moveable implants in the brain

“…Implantable microelectrodes are critical tools that are extensively used in neurophysiology to decipher brain function and dysfunction. They are also emerging as promising clinical devices in the treatment of a wide range of central nervous system (CNS) disorders including Parkinson's disease and depression, as well as hearing and visual impairment [1][2][3]. However, it has been frequently reported that the in vivo recording capabilities of the microelectrodes degrade over time in experimental animals due in part to the CNS immune response to injury and chronic implantation [2,[4][5][6][7][8][9].…”

“…However, it has been frequently reported that the in vivo recording capabilities of the microelectrodes degrade over time in experimental animals due in part to the CNS immune response to injury and chronic implantation [2,[4][5][6][7][8][9]. It is widely hypothesized that as a consequence of this immune 1 Author to whom any correspondence should be addressed.…”