Systems and methods for controlling a width of an excitation field created by current applied by a cochlear implant system

摘要

An exemplary sound processor (104) 1) identifies a stimulation site within a cochlea of a patient that is to be stimulated in order to represent acoustic content presented to the patient, the stimulation site included within a plurality of stimulation sites associated with a stimulation channel corresponding to a plurality of electrodes, 2) determines a target excitation field width associated with the stimulation channel and 3) dynamically sets, based on the identified stimulation site, an amplitude and a polarity of current to be applied to each electrode included in the plurality of electrodes in order to represent the acoustic content so that an excitation field created by the current has a width that roughly matches the target excitation field width. A system and a corresponding method are also disclosed.

主权项

1. A system comprising:
a processing facility that identifies a stimulation site within a cochlea of a patient that is to be stimulated in order to represent acoustic content presented to the patient, the stimulation site included within a plurality of stimulation sites associated with a stimulation channel corresponding to a plurality of electrodes, the plurality of electrodes including one or more main electrodes and two or more compensating electrodes; and a stimulation management facility communicatively coupled to the processing facility and that
determines a target excitation field width associated with the stimulation channel,dynamically sets, based on the identified stimulation site, an amplitude and a polarity of main current to be applied to the one or more main electrodes in order to create an excitation field representative of the acoustic content, anddynamically sets, based on the identified stimulation site and the target excitation field width, an amplitude and a polarity of compensating current to be applied to each of the two or more compensating electrodes in order to focus or defocus the excitation field created by the main current to have a width that roughly matches the target excitation field width.