From manual to artificial intelligence fitting: Two cochlear implant case studies.

To assess whether CI programming by means of a software application using artificial intelligence (AI), FOX®, may improve cochlear implant (CI) performance. Two adult CI recipients who had mixed auditory results with their manual fitting were selected for an AI-assisted fitting. Even after 17 months CI experience and 19 manual fitting sessions, the first subject hadn't developed open set word recognition. The second subject, after 9 months of manual fitting, had developed good open set word recognition, but his scores remained poor at soft and loud presentation levels. Cochlear implant fitting parameters, pure tone thresholds, bisyllabic word recognition, phonemic discrimination scores and loudness scaling curves. For subject 1, a first approach trying to optimize the home maps by means of AI-proposed adaptations was not successful whereas a second approach based on the use of Automaps (an AI approach based on universal, i.e. population based group statistics) during 3 months allowed the development of open set word recognition. For subject 2, the word recognition scores improved at soft and loud intensities with the AI suggestions. The AI-suggested modifications seem to be atypical. The two case studies illustrate that adults implanted with manual CI fitting may experience an improvement in their auditory results with AI-assisted fitting.