At Victorian Hearing we are not affiliated with any hearing aid device manufacturer which allows our expert audiologists to compare all hearing aid technology. We are constantly reviewing the technology and finding what features will be best for your family, friends or yourself to meet their listening needs. Currently a hearing aid manufacturer that stands out in the modern space of artificial intelligence is Oticon. You may ask, what does artificial intelligence have to do with my hearing? In this article we will highlight how this can be advantageous to you.
Oticon has a Brain Hearing approach. Their research and development is based on the fact that detection of sound is only one part of the hearing journey, we as individuals also need to make sense of the sound for it to be meaningful. Detection of sound happens at the ear level and interpretation of these sounds happen at the brain level. You may have experience this yourself when you are chatting to a friend and you see the glazed look over their face and respond with “Are you listening?”. How Oticon has approached this in their hearing aids is to incorporate artificial intelligence.
- Their MoreSound Intelligence 2.0 technology upgrade features improvements in balancing the sound scene including environmental sounds, so that they are not distracting for the brain. The hearing aid is smart and programmed to classify different sound environments automatically e.g. speech in noise, speech in quiet, outdoor noise or music. Traditionally, hearing aid users might have to manually push a button to activate “speech in outdoor noise” settings, and now with it all incorporated into the MoreSound Intelligence 2.0 settings, pushing buttons each time you walk into a new sound environment is no longer necessary.
- Hearing Aids are designed for comfort: The hearing aids scan and analyse your surrounds instantly and precisely balances disruptive sounds like wind, handling noise, and sudden sounds that would be typically harsh on the ears. For example: accidently dropping the dishes or a slamming of a door. The speed at which it can handle these sudden impact noises have been faster than previous generations of hearing aids. Their new Wind & Handling Stablizer and SuddenSound Stablizer feature has been much appreciated by hearing aid users.
- Oticon has an open sound mimicking natural hearing. A key standout feature from Oticon compared to other manufactures is their approach to how it captures sound to be delivered to your ears. Non-hearing aid users hear the world all at once and their brain then choose which sounds to attend to. In a social setting around a table, there is conversation all around you. A traditional hearing aid has the microphone set up so that the hearing aid user hears best when they are facing the speaker and the hearing aid is programmed to cut background noise from your left and right or behind you. Whilst this traditional way of listening works great on a one to one basis, it is much less useful in a group situation when the conversations are bouncing from left to right very quickly. Oticon’s open sound focus, aims to improve client satisfaction in these group scenarios by comfortably picking up all the conversations.
They achieve this by their RealSound Technology which has artificial intelligence where the hearing aid’s deep neural network has been trained with 12 million real-life sound scenes. This makes it the most advanced hearing aid in their range of devices.
Ultimately, hearing loss can significantly impact a person’s quality of life and missing out on conversations means missing out on precious memories. However, with the right hearing solution, individuals with hearing loss can regain their ability to hear and communicate. With rapid advancements in hearing aid technology and artificial intelligence, you are welcome to request an appointment with your audiologist to explore what is the best solution for your significant other or your hearing needs.