Cluster of Excellence Hearing4all, Department of Otolaryngology and Institute of Audioneurotechnology (VIANNA), Hannover Medical School, Hannover, Germany.
Biomed Res Int. 2018 May 14;2018:3701954. doi: 10.1155/2018/3701954. eCollection 2018.
In order to reduce the large variations in clinical outcomes of patients with implanted MED-EL Floating Mass Transducer (FMT) at the round window (RW), several approaches were proposed to optimize FMT-RW coupling. Our previous study showed improved FMT-RW coupling by applying static RW loads utilizing the "Hannover Coupler" (HC) FMT-prosthesis but also demonstrated insufficient low frequency performance. Hence, a redesigned HC version (HCv2) was investigated in this study.
Experiments were performed in ASTM F2504-05 compliant fresh human temporal bones. The HCv2 is a FMT-prosthesis redesigned from a previous prototype to specifically improve low frequency performance. Stapes footplate (SFP) displacements in response to acoustic stimulation of the tympanic membrane and to FMT-RW stimulation at varying static force (0-100 mN) were measured by Laser-Doppler vibrometry.
SFP displacements were highly dependent on the applied RW load and had a global maximum at 15 mN when averaged at speech relevant frequencies (0.5-4 kHz). SFP responses at frequencies ≤ 1 kHz were up to 25 dB higher than responses achieved with the previous HC version.
Optimizing the HC prosthesis design resulted in improved SFP responses to RW stimulation especially at lower frequencies (≤1 kHz).
为了降低在圆窗（RW）处植入 MED-EL 浮动质量换能器（FMT）的患者的临床结果的巨大差异，提出了几种方法来优化 FMT-RW 耦合。我们之前的研究表明，通过应用静态 RW 负载利用“汉诺威耦合器”（HC）FMT-假体可以改善 FMT-RW 耦合，但也证明了低频性能不足。因此，本研究中研究了重新设计的 HC 版本（HCv2）。
在符合 ASTM F2504-05 标准的新鲜人颞骨中进行了实验。HCv2 是一种从先前原型重新设计的 FMT-假体，旨在特别改善低频性能。通过激光多普勒测振仪测量鼓膜声学刺激和不同静态力（0-100 mN）刺激 RW 时的镫骨底板（SFP）位移。
SFP 位移高度依赖于施加的 RW 负载，当在语音相关频率（0.5-4 kHz）处平均时，在 15 mN 时具有全局最大值。≤1 kHz 的频率处的 SFP 响应比之前的 HC 版本的响应高高达 25 dB。
优化 HC 假体设计导致 RW 刺激的 SFP 响应得到改善，特别是在较低频率（≤1 kHz）时。
