Electrically Evoked Compound Action Potential Studies Based on Finite Element and Neuron Models

Electrically evoked compound action potential (ECAP) represents a synchronous response of a group of nerve fibers activated by electrical stimulation. ECAP has been an important physiological signal for the cochlear implant (CI) used in various clinical studies. A 3-D CI model based on a patient’s medical images was created to simulate ECAP using the finite element method (FEM) and neuron models in this study. ECAPs obtained by alternating polarity approach were recorded by several sensing electrodes with different current levels. The least-square optimization method was used to calibrate the ECAP simulation results and they were compared with a patient’s clinical ECAP measurements. Results showed that calibrated simulations of ECAPs were consistent with the ECAP measurements. This study demonstrated that simulated ECAP based on CI models could be used as a reference for patient-specific CI studies for CI objective programming.