Method and system for use of hearing prosthesis for linguistic evaluation

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-9814879-B2
Application number	US-201313892747-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	May 13, 2013
Priority date	May 13, 2013
Publication date	Nov 14, 2017
Grant date	Nov 14, 2017

Abstract

A method and system to help determine the extent to which a hearing prosthesis recipient is exposed to speech. The hearing prosthesis will log data regarding audio input, optimally in correspondence with times when the hearing prosthesis is in a stimulation-on mode in which the hearing prosthesis is set to stimulate a physiological system of the recipient in accordance with received audio input, so as to facilitate identification of speech to which the recipient is exposed. Further, as the hearing prosthesis itself receives the audio input, the hearing prosthesis may analyze the audio input to determine one or more linguistic characteristics of the audio input, such as a quantity of speech by the recipient and/or by others, and the hearing prosthesis may output data representing the determined one or more linguistic characteristics. Advantageously, the data may then be used to help facilitate rehabilitation of the recipient.

First claim

We claim:

1. A method comprising:
receiving audio input into a hearing prosthesis that is operable to stimulate a physiological system of a recipient in accordance with the received audio input, the received audio input representing an audio environment of the recipient;
determining by the hearing prosthesis, based on the received audio input, linguistic characteristics of the audio environment, wherein the linguistic characteristics comprise (i) a measure of quantity of speech by the recipient and (ii) a measure of quantity of speech by one or more people other than the recipient;
generating by the hearing prosthesis data representing the determined linguistic characteristics; and
outputting the data from the hearing prosthesis.

2. The method of claim 1 , wherein the hearing prosthesis is selected from the group consisting of a hearing aid worn by the recipient and a device at least partially implanted in the recipient.

3. The method of claim 2 , wherein the hearing prosthesis comprises a cochlear implant, and wherein stimulating the physiological system of the recipient in accordance with the received audio input comprises stimulating one or more cochlear electrodes of the recipient in accordance with the received audio input.

4. The method of claim 2 , wherein the hearing prosthesis comprises a hearing aid, and wherein stimulating the physiological system of the recipient in accordance with the received audio input comprises delivering into an ear of the recipient an amplification of the received audio input.

5. The method of claim 2 , wherein the hearing prosthesis comprises a vibrationally-coupled hearing prosthesis, and wherein stimulating the physiological system of the recipient in accordance with the received audio input comprises delivering vibrations to the recipient in accordance with the received audio input.

6. The method of claim 1 , wherein the determining, generating, and outputting is carried out in real-time as the hearing prosthesis receives the audio input.

7. The method of claim 1 , further comprising receiving the output data into an external computing device, time-stamping the received data at the external computing device, and using the timestamped received data as a basis to present at least one comparison of change in linguistic characteristics over time.

8. The method of claim 1 , wherein the hearing prosthesis has a stimulation mode that switches between a stimulation-on mode in which the hearing prosthesis is set to stimulate the physiological system of the recipient in accordance with the audio input and a stimulation-off mode in which the hearing prosthesis is set to not stimulate the physiological system of the recipient in accordance with the audio input, and wherein generating the data representing the determined linguistic characteristics comprises:
basing the data at least in part on the stimulation mode of the hearing prosthesis.

9. The method of claim 8 , wherein the hearing prosthesis is switchable between the stimulation-on mode and the stimulation-off mode by the recipient.

10. The method of claim 8 , wherein basing the data at least in part on the stimulation mode of the hearing prosthesis comprises:
logging the determined linguistic characteristics separately for (i) when the hearing prosthesis is in the stimulation-on mode and (ii) when the hearing prosthesis is in the stimulation-off mode.

11. The method of claim 10 , wherein outputting the data from the hearing prosthesis comprises outputting separate sets of data (i) corresponding with when the hearing prosthesis was in the stimulation-on mode and (ii) corresponding with when the hearing prosthesis was in the stimulation-off mode.

12. The method of claim 11 , further comprising receiving the output data into an external computing device, time-stamping the received data at the external computing device, and using the timestamped received data as a basis to present at least one comparison of change in linguistic characteristics over time.

13. The method of claim 8 , wherein basing the data at least in part on the stimulation mode of the hearing prosthesis comprises:
including in the data indicia of when the hearing prosthesis was in the stimulation-on mode.

14. The method of claim 8 , wherein including in the data the one or more indicia of when the hearing prosthesis was in the stimulation-on mode comprises including in the data one or more correlations between times when the hearing prosthesis was in the stimulation-on mode and one or more of the determined linguistic characteristics.

15. The method of claim 1 ,
wherein at times the hearing prosthesis operates in a stimulation-on mode in which the hearing prosthesis is set to stimulate the physiological system of the recipient in accordance with audio input being received by the hearing prosthesis, and at other times the hearing prosthesis operates in a stimulation-off mode in which the hearing prosthesis is set to not stimulate the physiological system of the recipient in accordance with the audio input being received by the hearing prosthesis,
the hearing prosthesis basing the determining of the linguistic characteristics on the audio input received while the hearing prosthesis is in the stimulation-on mode but not on the audio input received while the hearing prosthesis is in the stimulation-off mode.

16. The method of claim 1 ,
wherein at times the hearing prosthesis operates in a stimulation-on mode in which the hearing prosthesis is set to stimulate the physiological system of the recipient in accordance with audio input being received by the hearing prosthesis, and at other times the hearing prosthesis operates in a stimulation-off mode in which the hearing prosthesis is set to not stimulate the physiological system of the recipient in accordance with the audio input being received by the hearing prosthesis, the method further comprising:
the hearing prosthesis limiting the generated data to be based on the audio input received while the hearing prosthesis is in the stimulation-on mode.

17. The method of claim 1 , further comprising:
the hearing prosthesis recording times when the received audio input causes the hearing prosthesis to stimulate the physiological system of the recipient;
the hearing prosthesis using the recorded times to determine which received audio input caused the hearing prosthesis to stimulate the physiological system of the recipient; and
the hearing prosthesis basing the determining of the linguistic characteristics on the determined received audio input.

18. The method of claim 1 , wherein the linguistic characteristics further comprise at least one characteristic selected from the group consisting of:
a measure of proportion of time spent by the recipient speaking,
a measure of proportion of time spent by the recipient receiving speech from others,
a measure of quantity of words spoken by the recipient,
a measure of quantity of sentences spoken by the recipient,
a measure of quantity of words spoken by one or more people other than the recipient,
a measure of quantity of sentences spoken by one or more people other than the recipient,
a measure of quantity of conversational turns by the recipient,
a measure of quantity of conversations initiated by the recipient,
a measure of quantity of phonetic features produced by the recipient,
a measure of length of utterances by the recipient or by others, and
a measure of speech quality.

19. The method of claim 1 , wherein the linguistic characteristics comprise at least one measure that

Assignees

• Cochlear Ltd

Inventors

• Banna Rami
• Case Alexander
• Hubert-Brierre Florent
• Kendrick Andrew

Classifications

• A61N1/36038 Primary

  Cochlear stimulation · CPC title

• H04R25/407

  Circuits for combining signals of a plurality of transducers · CPC title

• H04R25/606

  acting directly on the eardrum, the ossicles or the skull, e.g. mastoid, tooth, maxillary or mandibular bone, or mechanically stimulating the cochlea, e.g. at the oval window · CPC title

• A61N1/36032 Primary

  Human Necessities · mapped topic