Cochlear implant technology: past, present and future

Abstract

<p indent=0mm>Cochlear implant (CI) technology can help the majority of patients with severe to profound sensorineural deafness to restore hearing. This technology was first launched in 1800 by the Italian physicist Alessandro Volta who found that electrical stimulation of the normal ear can produce hearing. In the 1960s, it began to enter the practical stage, and underwent technological development in two directions, single-channel and multi-channel. In 1979, the single-channel cochlear implant was successfully developed in Peking Union Medical College Hospital (PUMCH), and the first cochlear implantation in China was performed in 1980 in PUMCH. The first multi-channel cochlear implantation in China was also performed in PUMCH in May 1995. As the technology progressed, cochlear implantation with electric-acoustic stimulation (EAS), bilateral cochlear implantation, and robot-assisted cochlear implantation gradually went on stage. The first EAS cochlear implantation in China was performed in 2012 in PUMCH, and research on bilateral cochlear implantation in PUMCH ranks at the forefront in China. With increasing successful cases of surgery, the indications for cochlear implantation have gradually extended. In 2008, preoperative electrical stimulation auditory evoked potential technology was successfully developed in PUMCH, which is novel in China, and by which a large number of difficult and complex cases were successfully implanted with CI. Cochlear implantation for unilateral deafness and tinnitus and robot-assisted cochlear implantation have also been carried out worldwide. The first robot-assisted cochlear implantation in China was successfully performed in 2020 in Shanghai 9^th People’s Hospital. At the same time, the research of optical cochlear implant has entered the experimental stage. This paper summarizes the development of cochlear implant technology in China and abroad, the current technical expansion and the future development trend, to provide reference for its technological progress.