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| Dr Ingeborg Hochmair |
Founder and CEO of MED-EL Medical Electronics, Ingeborg Hochmair, has received this year’s Lasker-De Bakey Clinical Medical Research Award for the development of the modern cochlear implant, a device that restores hearing to individuals with severe-to-profound deafness through electrical stimulation of the auditory nerve. She will share the award with Graeme M Clark (Emeritus, Univ of Melbourne, Australia) and Blake S Wilson (Duke University, NC, US). This award honours scientists whose contributions have improved the clinical treatment of patients.
Ingeborg Hochmair, in electrical engineering, is being recognised for her early contributions to the field of cochlear implants starting with the development of the world’s first multi-channel microelectronic cochlear implant that was implanted in Vienna in 1977. This implant included a long, flexible electrode, which could, for the first time, deliver electric signals to the auditory nerve along a large part of the cochlea, the snail-shaped inner ear. With a modified version of this device, the next milestone in cochlear implant development was reached in 1979: the understanding of words and sentences without lip-reading in a quiet environment via a small, body-worn sound processor. The young recipient, a pioneer herself because she devoted much of her time to cochlear implant research, has enjoyed open speech understanding via a small processor for the past 34 years. Intense and continuous innovation followed, including the development of the world’s first behind-the-ear (BTE) cochlear implant audio processor in 1991.
The next major advancement was the development of a high stimulation rate cochlear implant designed to faithfully implement a new speech coding strategy developed by Blake Wilson. From 1994 forward, this device took its users to the next level of performance.
Respect for the cochlea and its delicate structures have guided Dr Hochmair´s research and development activities towards a highly flexible electrode array preserving the delicate structures of the cochlea despite deep insertion into the cochlea. During recent years, Dr Hochmair and Wilson have collaborated on current topics such as the benefit of bilateral implantation, combined electric and acoustic stimulation, and of cochlear implants for single-sided deafness.
Dr Hochmair’s intellectual rigour, pioneering spirit, and life-long drive toward excellence have transformed the lives of nearly 100,000 individuals around the world.
“Many of these achievements were attained with the shared commitment of my husband and closest collaborator, electrical engineer Erwin Hochmair, and with other outstanding partners, such as basic researchers, surgeons, clinicians, and co-workers at MED-EL and, ultimately, the end-users of the devices,” said Dr Hochmair.
Together with Prof Erwin Hochmair, Ingeborg Hochmair founded MED-EL with a vision that would ultimately bring cutting-edge applications to life in more than 100 countries. The company is privately held, and Ingeborg Hochmair remains at the helm. Being CEO of MED-EL is not simply a job for Dr Hochmair; it is her life. Helping people overcome hearing loss as a barrier to communication was a founding principle of MED-EL and remains her mission and her passion. Improving the quality of life of patients continues to be a personal and professional core value that is lived every day through her leadership at MED-EL.
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