Subject: Re: Hearing aid owner dissatisfaction From: "Freed, Dan" <DFreed(at)HEI.ORG> Date: Wed, 31 Mar 2004 15:47:49 -0800I recall reading a description of a headset-style hearing aid on the website of Sensimetrics (www.sens.com). I believe it was developed by Pat Zurek. If I remember correctly, the electronics were contained within the headband, so no body-worn processor was required. I notice that the website doesn't mention it anymore. Is there anybody out there from Sensimetrics who can provide more information? I think that hearing aids will always carry more stigma than eyeglasses, even if they work perfectly, because hearing loss is so strongly associated with aging. Dan Freed Senior Engineer, Hearing Aid Research Lab House Ear Institute 2100 W. Third St. Los Angeles, CA 90057 USA Phone: +1-213-353-7084 Fax: +1-213-413-0950 Email: dfreed(at)hei.org -----Original Message----- From: AUDITORY Research in Auditory Perception [mailto:AUDITORY(at)LISTS.MCGILL.CA]On Behalf Of Maher, Rob Sent: Wednesday, March 31, 2004 2:56 PM To: AUDITORY(at)LISTS.MCGILL.CA Subject: Re: Hearing aid owner dissatisfaction After seeing that (1) and (2) are related to hearing aid performance, I wonder if there has been any research comparing the true potential available benefit from a high performance signal processing system vs. the market-driven low-power BTE and ITE hearing instruments. Specifically, I have a hunch that better performance might be available using off-the-shelf signal processing elements rather than trying to make everything fit in a thimble and run on 1.2V. The user might then be able to tune the device using training sessions on a PC. Are there laboratory research systems that give users more benefit than what is available on the market? The anecdotes I hear are that users wouldn't mind wearing a Walkman-style headset and belt-mounted processor if the hearing aid actually provided sufficient benefit. The tacit reason users want hidden devices is that they don't really work too well and therefore people are embarrassed to be seen as "impaired". We seem to have overcome the social stigma of eyeglasses (arguably because they work!). Rob Maher Associate Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering Montana State University-Bozeman rob.maher(at)montana.edu Brent Edwards wrote: > From an article published in 2000 on the hearing aid in the drawer > phenomenon, the top 20 reasons why hearing aid owners don't use their > hearing aids are: > > 1. Poor benefit > 2. Background noise/noisy situations ...