Open ear hearing aids fitting

Open ear hearing aids fitting

Open ear fitting is a hearing aid technology that has made great progress in the field of audiology. The traditional open-ear hearing aid refers to the use of a large-aperture ventilation hole to solve the problem of ear plugging effect, but in fact it cannot be truly open. The core and challenge of open ear technology is how to control feedback and provide the required gain. Now with the development of digital signal processing technology for hearing aids and continuous innovation in industrial design, open ear hearing aids are both beautiful, comfortable, effective and capable of long-term performance. The good nature of time-stable work is being accepted by more and more hearing-impaired people.

History of Open Ear fitting

1. Why open ear matching
Clinical reports show that when hearing-impaired people seek assistance from hearing aids to obtain hearing compensation, about 30% of complaints come from the sense of blockage and discomfort in the ear canal, and the consciousness and consciousness of hearing aid wearers. Too loud or too stuffy, commonly known as the ear plugging effect. Although this problem has been discovered and recognized by some clinical audiology researchers from the 1960s to the early 1970s, and the concept of open ear matching for hearing aids has been proposed, the open ear matching technology has been in the following decades. There have been no substantive results. Even in 2002, Kochkin’s survey data showed that less than 25% of people with disabilities who could have benefited from hearing aids owned and worn hearing aids, and about 75% of those who did not wear hearing aids were aged From 35 to 75, the most and most prominent among them is the hearing impaired people with mild hearing impairment or high-frequency steep drop hearing loss with a low-frequency hearing threshold of less than 40dB. It is even more regrettable that they are lost because they do not wear hearing aids. Hear what the original hearing aid can offer. Until the beginning of the 21st century, major breakthroughs were made in the research and implementation of open ear matching technology, and it gradually began to be accepted and welcomed by the hearing impaired. 2007 US industry statistics show that in the past few years, the market share of BTE hearing aids has gradually increased. For example, in 2007, the sales of BTE hearing aids accounted for more than 50% of all sold hearing aids. The main reason hearing aids have taken the world by storm is the injection of new open ear options. The new open ear matching technology not only makes the volume and appearance of hearing aids more stylish and compact, and meets the psychological aesthetic expectations of hearing impaired people. More importantly, the open ear matching can meet most hearing impaired people to some extent. Respect for the audibility of speech signals, speech intelligibility and
The need for wearing comfort, which is not actually provided by ordinary hearing aids.
2. Development of open ear hearing aids
In terms of the structure of the open ear hearing aid, the development of the open ear matching technology has gone through about three stages so far.
At first, the traditional standard open ear hearing aids were only made with special vent holes with large inner diameters on custom ear molds or shells, so as to achieve the opening of the ear canal and the relief of the ear plugging effect.
The second generation of open-ear hearing aids is to replace the traditional 3 ~ 4mm flare horn tube and customized ear molds with 0.8mm inner diameter special material sound tube and different types of standard open earplugs. Volume in order to obtain miniature aesthetics of hearing aids.
The latest open ear technology is called earphone receiver technology (recelver in canal, RIC; receiver in the ear, RITE), which moves the earphone originally located in the body of the hearing aid to the open earplug, and the movement and external The connection of the ear canal receiver is realized by a metal wire in a thin insulating tube, and this part is also responsible for the task of the traditional ear hook.