The contribution of apical stimulation to Mandarin speech perception in users of the MED-EL COMBI 40+ cochlear implant.
CONCLUSIONS
Not stimulating the apical cochlear region in tonal language speaking cochlear implantees significantly reduces discrimination of Mandarin vowels. The data presented here suggest that electrode arrays that allow complete cochlear coverage with stimulation pulses seem to be preferable over shorter arrays for use in cochlear implant (CI) indications.


OBJECTIVE
To assess the contribution of electrical stimulation beyond the first cochlear turn on tonal language speech perception.


METHODS
Twelve Mandarin-speaking users of the MED-EL COMBI 40+ cochlear implant with complete insertion of the standard COMBI 40+ electrode array participated in the study. Acute speech tests were performed in seven electrode configurations with stimulation either distributed over the whole length of the cochlea or restricted to the apical, middle or basal regions. The test battery comprised tone, consonant, and vowel identification in quiet as well as a sentence recognition task in quiet and noise.


RESULTS
While neither tone nor consonant identification depended crucially on the placement of the active electrodes, vowel identification and sentence recognition decreased significantly when the four apical electrodes were not stimulated.
Qi
Beier
B
Beijing Tong Ren Hospital, Capital Medical University, Beijing Institute of Otolaryngology, Ministry of Education, China.
Liu
Bo
B
Krenmayr
Andreas
A
Liu
Sha
S
Gong
Shusheng
S
Liu
Haihong
H
Zhang
Ning
N
Han
Demin
D
D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D003051:Cochlea / Q000503:physiopathology*; D019929:Cochlear Implantation / Q000379:methods*; D003054:Cochlear Implants; D003638:Deafness / Q000503:physiopathology / Q000534:rehabilitation*; D004567:Electrodes, Implanted; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007802:Language; D008297:Male; D010470:Perceptual Masking / Q000502:physiology; D010700:Phonetics; D011474:Prosthesis Design; D013061:Speech Acoustics; D013067:Speech Perception / Q000502:physiology*; D013069:Speech Reception Threshold Test; D055815:Young Adult