Transducer Type and Design Influence on the Hearing Loss Compensation Behaviour of the Electromagnetic Middle Ear Implant in a Finite Element Analysis

Abstract

Several types of electromagnetic transducer for the middle ear implants (MEIs) have been developed as an alternative to conventional hearing aids for the rehabilitation of sensorineural hearing loss. Electromagnetic transducer type and design are thought to have a significant influence on their hearing compensation performance. To investigate these effects, a middle ear computational model was constructed based on a complete set of microcomputerized tomography section images of a human ear. Its validity was confirmed by comparing the model predicted motions with published experimental measurements. The result shows that the eardrum driving transducer (EDT) is superior to the floating mass transducer (FMT) in hearing compensation when the transducer mass is small but inferior to the FMT when the mass gets bigger. The incus body driving transducer (IBDT) is the most ineffective type of transducer for hearing compensation. Moreover, the masses of the EDT and the FMT decrease the transducer performance mainly at higher frequencies: the greater the transducer mass, the lower the displacement of the stapes excited by these transducers. On the other hand, the IBDT driving rod stiffness decreases transducer's performance severely at low frequencies and its adverse effect on transducer performance increases with the decrease of the stiffness of the IBDT driving rod.

Evaluation of Round Window Stimulation Performance in Otosclerosis Using Finite Element Modeling

“…The material properties used for the FE model were listed in Table 2 . These properties of the middle ear components were initially selected from published data [ 24 – 28 ]. Then, these values were turned by matching the simulated responses to the experimental responses.…”

Dynamics of the Middle Ear with an Implantable Hearing Device. An improved Electromechanical Model

“…The studies investigated the effect of implant fixation to the auditory bone on stapes dynamics. In most studies, the problem of implanted middle ear was either investigated by the finite element method [23,22,5,20,24,6,25] or studied experimentally [9,19,12,21,7,16,17,10,1,3] However, it is practically impossible to find a study that would use an electromechanical lumped parameter model of the implanted middle ear. To our knowledge, the first and only one study to propose such a model is [15], in which the linear electromechanical coupling (EMC) was introduced to describe the connection between the mechanical and the electrical part of the implant.…”

Comparative study of efficiency and characteristics of FMT and DRT installed in human cadavers for round-window stimulation

“…In recent studies, round-window (RW) vibroplasty with AMEI vibration transducers has been the focus of investigation because RW stimulation can be used to treat patients with middle ear diseases, such as otosclerosis 8 – 17 . Over the past 10 years, many studies have verified the effectiveness of RW stimulation, but the vibration transducers used for RW stimulation have been the transducers used in conventional AMEIs.…”