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Introduction |
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For a client who is about
to go through the process of perhaps purchasing a hearing aid it can
be very confusing and mind baffling to have a small acrylic or plastic
device no bigger than a 50 cent piece placed in front of them and be
told, this will cost you several thousand dollars!!
Wow! Is my hearing really that bad? No way am I going to spend that
amount so I can hear again!
So what do you do? How much is your hearing worth?
Let’s take a look at the history of hearing aids to try and explain
how we have arrived where we are today.
Digital hearing aids first came to market in the 1980’s and while
high-tech for their time, these hearing aids had little success
and were soon abandoned due to their large size and high battery drain.
Nearly a decade later, once again digital hearing aids were introduced.
By this time, the technology had improved so that these hearing
aids
could be produced in a range of popular styles, from behind-the-ear
(BTE) to completely-in-the-canal (CIC).
Today, there has been an explosion in the number of digital hearing
aids on the market, however, they are much higher in cost, but have
been well received by clinicians and consumers.
| Advances in Hearing Aid Technology |
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Omni-directional – Captures sound equally
from all directions – surround sound, (omni means “all” or “every”).
Although omni directional mics are very useful in the right situations,
picking up sound from every direction is not usually what you need.
Omni sound is very general and unfocused – if you are trying
to capture sound from a particular subject or area it is likely
to be overwhelmed by other noise. |
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Cardioid – Cardioid means “heart-shaped”,
which is the type of pick-up pattern these mics use. Sound is picked
up mostly from the front and less from the side while eliminating
most sound from the rear. |
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Hyper-cardioid – This is
an exaggerated version of the cardioids pattern. Concentrated amplification
from
in front with less from the sides and behind. Due to the long
thin design of hypercardioids, they are often referred to as
shotgun
microphones. |
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Super-cardioid – again, this
microphone patterns is more sensitive to sound from in front
and reduced from
behind. |
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Bi-directional – picks up sound from two
opposite directions. Uses a figure-of-eight pattern and picks up
sound equally from two opposite directions. |
Adaptive Directional Microphone – directional
microphones adapt to the listening situations, seeking out
the noise source (i.e., noise sources that are moving relative
to the
listener),
filtering it out (creating a null point) and enhancing a speech
signal (allow a patient to hear speech in front of them and
reduce or eliminate noise behind them). The Adaptive Directional
Microphone
(ADM) adapts into and out of an omni-directional and the varying
cardioid directional modes, all the while optimising the polar
pattern for the listener, even in wind noise. The ADM is the
ideal system
for quiet, noisy and windy environments alike.
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Ear-to-ear communication (Bluetooth) – Hearing
aids that communicate with each other, reading the sound environment
allowing each aid to set parameters within the aid maximizes noise
reduction and speech enhancement. |
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| Other Features |
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Multiple memories – multi-memory
hearing aids (also called multi-program hearing aids) give the
aid wearer some control over the type of amplification provided i.e.,
can allow
for 2 to 4 programs within an aids that the user may select to
maximize hearing in a variety of listening situations. For instance,
one program
may be used in a quiet situations, another program may be used
to control noise in restaurants, and another may be for music or theatre
listening.
Adaptive noise suppression – hearing aids with
adaptive noise suppression sense the characteristics of the background
noise, and automatically
change the tone controls to suit. In traffic noise, for example,
the amplification for low-frequency sounds is decreased. Unfortunately,
the amplification given to the same frequencies in the speech
signal
is also decreased by the same amount. Consequently, adaptive
noise suppression usually does not make speech easier to understand,
but it does make
listening more comfortable and less fatiguing.
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| The Latest Trends |
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Open ear fittings - miniature behind
the ear (BTE) instruments that are fitted using an inconspicuous
non-occluding (open) tube, instead of the traditional larger ear mould.
This allows
the patient to make maximum use of their natural residual hearing
since the ear is completely open, and eliminates the occlusion effect.
It
improves “own voice” quality which is showing a trend
in consumers actually wearing their hearing aids more often.
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