New total invisible hearing implant?

starrygaze

starrygaze

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Found topic in Popular Science about Envoy device for sensorineural hearing loss. I might think it is not for deaf benefit. It is for some old people or who have sensorineural problem. Just got this from magazine. I wish that would have invisible CI technology in future.

Hearing Aids, Sensorineural Hearing Loss, Hearing Impaired - Envoy Medical
 
starrygaze said:
Found topic in Popular Science about Envoy device for sensorineural hearing loss. I might think it is not for deaf benefit. It is for some old people or who have sensorineural problem. Just got this from magazine. I wish that would have invisible CI technology in future.

Hearing Aids, Sensorineural Hearing Loss, Hearing Impaired - Envoy Medical
Click to expand...


actually, it is not invisble per se but totally implantable HEARING AID (It's a middle ear implant not a cochlear implant)

And not FDA approved yet in USA.
 
whats the difference between this and ci?

hmmm.what is this? how is it differnet than a ci? i see that little hammer thing banging away.Guess it doesnt give as full of a range as a CI.Doesnt give much info...if have to have an implant and go through all of that want to hear as well as possible.Just wonder for people like myself with menieres if the balance problem would be less.Anyone else have any experience or info on these?
 
TAMI SAM said:
hmmm.what is this? how is it differnet than a ci? i see that little hammer thing banging away.Guess it doesnt give as full of a range as a CI.Doesnt give much info...if have to have an implant and go through all of that want to hear as well as possible.Just wonder for people like myself with menieres if the balance problem would be less.Anyone else have any experience or info on these?
Click to expand...

The Envoy continues to use the inner ear as typical in a hearing person. The assumption is the cochlear hairs in the cochlea are not the problem. In other words, the inner ear apparently still works. A CI on the other hand, bypasses the outer, middle, and inner ear and goes straight to the cochlear nerve (which goes straight to the brain) to transmit the pertinent information. This is because the cochlear hairs can no longer do the job or better said the inner ear doesn't work properly anymore. There is a big difference between the two.

If your problem is a bad middle ear, then the Envoy would be the way to go as technology cannot yet truly replace the functionality of the inner ear. It is much easier to "mimic" the function of the middle ear than the inner ear at this time. CIs simply attempt to "mimic" as much as possible the function of the cochlea. Do not misunderstand me. Current CIs are great as I can whole heartly attest (I have one!!!) but they cannot yet totally replace the functionality of what the cochlea does. When one has no other choice, a CI is a pretty good solution to a bad situation.
 
sr171soars said:
The Envoy continues to use the inner ear as typical in a hearing person. The assumption is the cochlear hairs in the cochlea are not the problem. In other words, the inner ear apparently still works. A CI on the other hand, bypasses the outer, middle, and inner ear and goes straight to the cochlear nerve (which goes straight to the brain) to transmit the pertinent information. This is because the cochlear hairs can no longer do the job or better said the inner ear doesn't work properly anymore. There is a big difference between the two.
Click to expand...


Let me clarify you.. CI only bypasses outer and middle ear. that's it. Cochlea is inner ear. :)

Envoy simply use the eardrum and cochlea to make it work.
How the Envoy® Device Works

* the natural ear collects sound from the environment
* the sound waves create normal vibration of the eardrum
* the natural vibrations are sensed and processed by the Envoy®
* a customized dose of energy is applied to the cochlea
* the cochlea converts the energy and vibration into signals and the brain interprets the signals into sound
Click to expand...
(from How Hearing Works - Sensorineural Hearing Loss, Hearing Impaired )
 
Boult said:
Let me clarify you.. CI only bypasses outer and middle ear. that's it. Cochlea is inner ear. :)

Envoy simply use the eardrum and cochlea to make it work.

(from How Hearing Works - Sensorineural Hearing Loss, Hearing Impaired )
Click to expand...

Er...perhaps I didn't make myself clearer with this. It doesn't use the cochlea itself to transmit the information to the brain. It uses the cochlear nerve to do so which is inside the cochlea. A CI doesn't use the cochlea in the same fashion as the hearing use it. Meaning the fluid pressure movements coming from the middle ear. In this sense, it bypasses the inner ear. Maybe we are quibbling here over semantics...;)
 
sr171soars said:
Er...perhaps I didn't make myself clearer with this. It doesn't use the cochlea itself to transmit the information to the brain. It uses the cochlear nerve to do so which is inside the cochlea. A CI doesn't use the cochlea in the same fashion as the hearing use it. Meaning the fluid pressure movements coming from the middle ear. In this sense, it bypasses the inner ear. Maybe we are quibbling here over semantics...;)
Click to expand...
Yes it does because it is inserted into cochlea and hug the wall of cochlea so the auditory nerves that attach to cochlea can receive stimulation from the electrode. You have seen all the video of how it is done. :)



you see the auditory nerve fiber has to be intact for it to go thru. If it is not then cochlea is no good. anyway CI needs inner ear to work! period! if can't use cochlea then the alt route is ABI.

If it does not use cochlea then it would not be called Cochlear implant right?



hahaha
 
Since it's a middle ear implant, that means it would be appropriate for conductive losses but not sensorineural ones, right? (Just a bit confused by the original post.)
 
Boult said:
Yes it does because it is inserted into cochlea and hug the wall of cochlea so the auditory nerves that attach to cochlea can receive stimulation from the electrode. You have seen all the video of how it is done. :)

you see the auditory nerve fiber has to be intact for it to go thru. If it is not then cochlea is no good. and the alt route is ABI.

If it does not use cochlea then it would not be called Cochlear implant right?

hahaha
Click to expand...

Lets not get all tangled up here. :D You know what I meant and lets leave it at that. I will agree with you in terms of the cochlear nerve itself within the cochlea. But how the CI stimulates the "cochlea nerve" and how the hearing stimulate it are two different things.

Umm...be careful of the implant analogy. Take a mechanical heart implant, it replaced the actual heart and took over the heart's function. In that case, that sort of what is a cochlear implant is. It took over what the fluid movement of the cochelar hairs did (which are not viable enough to provide hearing anymore) and directly stimulates the nerve. The CI is using the shell of the cochlea to get the job done. I will agree with you that we aren't totally bypassing the inner ear.

Peace!
 
ismi said:
Since it's a middle ear implant, that means it would be appropriate for conductive losses but not sensorineural ones, right? (Just a bit confused by the original post.)
Click to expand...

Yea, that bothered me too. I would agree on the conductive loss bit.
 
Boult said:
Yes it does because it is inserted into cochlea and hug the wall of cochlea so the auditory nerves that attach to cochlea can receive stimulation from the electrode. You have seen all the video of how it is done. :)

you see the auditory nerve fiber has to be intact for it to go thru. If it is not then cochlea is no good. anyway CI needs inner ear to work! period! if can't use cochlea then the alt route is ABI.

If it does not use cochlea then it would not be called Cochlear implant right?

hahaha
Click to expand...
Actually.....

PArt of the cochlea are the haicells. They do not work any more...
A CI in a cochlea without fluid would still work.
The cochlea allows the pressure of the fluid to be transmitted to haircells that create electrical potentials on the nerve. In most cases, deafness is from haircells not working any more.

But... the CI is inserted inside the cochlea, with the walls of the cochlea preferably intact. (no ossification..)

So we need the cochlea, but the cochlea itself is not working any more....
 
sr171soars said:
Lets not get all tangled up here. :D You know what I meant and lets leave it at that. I will agree with you in terms of the cochlear nerve itself within the cochlea. But how the CI stimulates the "cochlea nerve" and how the hearing stimulate it are two different things.

Umm...be careful of the implant analogy. Take a mechanical heart implant, it replaced the actual heart and took over the heart's function. In that case, that sort of what is a cochlear implant is. It took over what the fluid movement of the cochelar hairs did (which are not viable enough to provide hearing anymore) and directly stimulates the nerve. The CI is using the shell of the cochlea to get the job done. I will agree with you that we aren't totally bypassing the inner ear.

Peace!
Click to expand...

Yep.
 
Cloggy said:
Actually.....

PArt of the cochlea are the haicells. They do not work any more...
A CI in a cochlea without fluid would still work.
The cochlea allows the pressure of the fluid to be transmitted to haircells that create electrical potentials on the nerve. In most cases, deafness is from haircells not working any more.

But... the CI is inserted inside the cochlea, with the walls of the cochlea preferably intact. (no ossification..)

So we need the cochlea, but the cochlea itself is not working any more....
Click to expand...

Those hair cells are called cillia.
 
Wow thanks for so much info.you guys are so smart on all of this im just wading into all this and still calling the cilia hair thingys.well i wrote company.it'll be intersting to see if I hear back.this is not for sale or approved by the FDA so it may never come to pass.
 
THe Envoy is as stated an implantable hearing aid. The clinical trials are on going at this time in the US. The only piece of external equiptment is a remote control used to turn it on and off and change channels. (I believe it has 4, I could ask my daughter if you really want to know for sure) you can read about it on the companies web site by doing a search for the Envoy.

THe trial includes people with bi lateral sense/neural hearing loss ranging from mild to severe, who have worn HA's for at least 6 months. Not sure about the conductive loss that's been mentioned here. The battery is placed under the skin by the ear and is 'supposed' to last around 5 years. Kinda like a pace maker.

The advantages are that it uses the ears normal pathways to bring sound to the chochlea. The sound is amplyfied in the middle ear much like a hearing aid, but I really don't know how they do it. The part that rocks simulates the motion of the three bones, perhaps it's the speed that the thing rocks at that increases the vol. I think it have much more flexiblity then HA's....my daughter evidently said the bass was to loud (we have lower frequency loss) evidently this is helping her pick up frequencies that she really hasn't heard in all her years of wearing HA's.

As I've said at this time the clinical trial is ongoing and there have been ups and downs for most of the people. (but without those willing to be the guinea pigs there would be no new things like CI's and internal HA's) It does seem to work pretty good once it's set up right, my daughters hearing tests actually seem to be better then when she was using the external hearing aide.
 
Is it the Bionic ear or a completely different hearing device?
 
shel90 said:
Is it the Bionic ear or a completely different hearing device?
Click to expand...

I wouldn't call the Envoy a bionic ear as such. It still uses the outer and inner ear in this setup. A CI is much closer to the concept of a bionic ear. It pretty much bypasses the outer/middle/inner ear excepting using the cochlear shell and the nerve in it to stimulate the cochear nerve to get info to the brain. The true bionic ear would be the ABI (Auditory Brainstem Implant) which goes straight to the brain totally bypassing the outer/middle/inner plus the cochlear nerve.
 
It looks just as invasive as a cochlear implant (thus the risk of meningitis is probably about the same). Plus it runs on a battery.. that means every 4 to 5 years they have to cut your head open again to replace the battery. I don't like the sound of that.

I don't really think this is good or bad, I think the audience for this device is more narrow, as it requires both a working eardrum and a working cochlea. For some people though this would be better than a cochlear implant and for those who qualify for such a device, should provide a much more natural hearing experience.

People who have lost their hearing due to head trauma or bone disease like osteoporosis would be the most likely candidates I think.
 
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