Budget-Friendly Solution for Hearing Loss: Wireless Earphones Perform Similarly to Traditional Hearing Aids

Bad Hearing Old Woman

Hearing is an essential part of daily life and good hearing is important for communication, learning, and overall quality of life. Poor hearing, also known as hearing loss or deafness, can have a significant impact on an individual’s social and emotional well-being, as well as their ability to fully participate in daily activities. It is important to address hearing loss early on and seek treatment, such as hearing aids or other assistive devices, to prevent further deterioration and improve the overall quality of life.

According to a study recently published in the journal iScience, some commercial earbuds may be as effective as hearing aids in amplifying sound for individuals with hearing loss.

This finding could provide a more affordable and accessible option for the large proportion of people with hearing loss who face barriers to obtaining professional hearing aids. These barriers include the high cost and the need for multiple visits to otolaryngologists and audiologists for tuning. It is estimated that nearly 75% of people with hearing loss in the United States do not use hearing aids.

“There’s also a social stigma associated with hearing aids,” says Yen-fu Cheng, the study’s corresponding author and an otolaryngologist at Taipei Veterans General Hospital. “Many patients are reluctant to wear them because they don’t want to appear old. So, we started exploring if there are more accessible alternatives.”

Apple came out with a feature called “Live Listen” in 2016 that allows people to use its wireless earphones, AirPods, and iPhone for sound amplification. The feature makes AirPods functionally similar to a personal sound amplification product, which is designed for people with normal hearing for certain occasions like birdwatching.

Cheng and his team wanted to investigate whether AirPods, which are widely available devices, can serve as alternative hearing aids. The team compared Airpods 2 and AirPods Pro—the model with a noise canceling feature—with a type of premium hearing aids and a basic pair of hearing aids. The premium hearing aids cost $10,000, and the basic type cost $1,500. Both models of AirPods are significantly cheaper than hearing aids, with AirPods 2 costing $129 and AirPods Pro costing $249. Notably, AirPods Pro met four out of five technology standards for hearing aids.

The team tested the four devices with 21 participants with mild to moderate hearing loss. The researchers read a short sentence, such as “the electricity bills went up recently,” to participants, who were asked to repeat their words verbatim wearing the devices. They found AirPods Pro performed similarly well compared with basic hearing aids in a quiet environment and is slightly inferior to premium hearing aids. AirPods 2, while having the lowest performance among the four, helped participants hear more clearly compared with wearing no hearing aids.

In a noisy environment, AirPods Pro showed comparable performance to premium hearing aids when the noises came from the lateral direction of the participant. But when the noises came from the front of the participants, both AirPods models failed to help participants hear better.

“Two reasons may account for the difference between the two scenarios,” says Ying-Hui Lai, the study’s co-author and a bioengineer at National Yang Ming Chiao Tung University in Taipei. “It may relate to the trajectories soundwaves travel with, as well as the advanced signal processing algorithm by premium hearing aids. This finding will hopefully inspire engineers to design hearing aids and personal sound amplification products that are more sensitive in certain directions.” He adds that AirPods Pro appears to perform better than AirPods 2, likely because of its noise-canceling feature.

“Globally, the wireless earphone market is growing rapidly. Some companies are interested in exploring the possibility of designing earbuds with sound amplification features. Our study proves that the idea is plausible,” Lai says.

As a clinician, Cheng says persuading patients to use hearing aids is often challenging. “These wireless earbuds are of course not perfect, but they would be a good starting point for many patients who don’t have access to professional hearing aids. They will see an increase in quality of life even with these earbuds.” Cheng says.

Reference: “Smartphone-bundled earphones as personal sound amplification products in adults with sensorineural hearing loss” by Heng-Yu Haley Lin, Hoi-Shan Lai, Chii-Yuan Huang, Chih-Hao Chen, Shang-Liang Wu, Yuan-Chia Chu, Yu-Fu Chen, Ying-Hui Lai and Yen-Fu Cheng, 15 November 2022, iScience.
DOI: 10.1016/j.isci.2022.105436

The study was funded by the Veterans General Hospitals and University System of Taiwan Joint Research Program, and the Ministry of Science and Technology.

7 Comments on "Budget-Friendly Solution for Hearing Loss: Wireless Earphones Perform Similarly to Traditional Hearing Aids"

  1. Excellent news for those with hearing loss.

  2. The study does not indicate the positioning of the iphone itself which contains the mic. Hearing aids are self contained whereas the airpods rely on the phone based mic and Bluetooth transmitter. I can imagine phone placement is of great importance to the quality of sound and this study.

  3. Very useful information because I suffer from iheaering impairment.

  4. Regarding a comment above. Earbuds / pods typically have a built in microphone (for making phone calls etc.) so the position of the phone is moot.

  5. Very interesting. I will definitely try any viable such option presented as actual hearing aids have failed me in that after all that expense, they simply amplified all sounds, did not make speech stand out, and beeped up and down adjusting levels until I threw them off and have never looked back. And they were a hassle with combing my long hair, forever getting caught and faling off. I hated them. And I love and hear very well with my $49 ear buds! So comfy I forget them and I have often wished they performed a hearing aid function.

  6. I keep my phone close to me at all times and I can charge it next to my chair.Would I need an I-Phone??? I have an android smart phone.🤓🙏🙏🙏🦅🇺🇸

  7. Feelin Old?
    That’s nothing. I wear hearing aids. I had Speech therapy and it helps and at same token it has cause me a great deal of anxiety and it was hard to get a girl friend cuz every flicking person made fun of me. Come talk to me I’ll tell you all the ins and outs about hearing aids. I’m 63. Hearing Aids SUCK

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