Lewis Richard F
ORL J Otorhinolaryngol Relat Spec. 2015;77(4):219-226. doi: 10.1159/000433551. Epub 2015 Sep 15.
Loss of peripheral vestibular function results in debilitating postural, perceptual, and visual symptoms. A new approach to treating this clinical problem is to replace some aspects of peripheral vestibular function with a prosthesis that senses head motion and provides this information to the brain by stimulating the vestibular nerve. In this paper, I review studies done in animals over the past 15 years which lay the groundwork for transferring this approach to human patients with severe peripheral vestibular damage. The animal studies demonstrate that the visual and perceptual defects associated with peripheral vestibular damage can be improved with a vestibular implant, but the data on postural control remain less conclusive at this point in time.
外周前庭功能丧失会导致使人衰弱的姿势、感知和视觉症状。治疗这一临床问题的一种新方法是使用一种假体来替代外周前庭功能的某些方面，该假体能够感知头部运动，并通过刺激前庭神经将此信息传递给大脑。在本文中，我回顾了过去15年在动物身上进行的研究，这些研究为将这种方法应用于患有严重外周前庭损伤的人类患者奠定了基础。动物研究表明，前庭植入物可以改善与外周前庭损伤相关的视觉和感知缺陷，但目前关于姿势控制的数据仍不太确凿。
