HEARING AID HAVING LEVEL AND FREQUENCY-DEPENDENT GAIN

摘要

An improved open-ear hearing aid to compensate for hearing loss includes a microphone for picking up incident sound and converting it to an electrical audio signal. An ear insert positionable within a human ear canal is provided for producing an output sound amplified within one or more frequency bands in response to incident sound picked up by the microphone. The in-band gain of the amplified sound output of the ear insert's loudspeaker is dependent on the user's hearing loss characteristics and the sound pressure levels of the incident sound. The form of the ear insert allows transmission of incident sound directly to the eardrum, where it is summed at the eardrum with the amplified sound output from the ear insert. Sound output is maximum at low incident sound pressure levels and minimum when the incident sound exceeds a set cut-off level.

主权项

1. An open-ear hearing aid for compensating for loss of hearing in the human ear comprising:
input means for picking up incident sound to be received by the human ear and converting it to an electrical audio signal, output means including an output transducer positionable within a human ear canal for producing a sound output in response to incident sound picked-up by said input means, said output means having a form that allows transmission of incident sound directly to the eardrum, where it combines with the sound output from said output transducer, the combination of incident sound and sound output from said output means resulting in the sound perceived by the wearer of the hearing aid, and signal processing means for processing the electrical audio signal from said input means, wherein the characteristics of the sound output from said output transducer are at least in part determined by said signal processing means, said signal processing means producing the following characteristics in the sound output that combines with incident sound:
i) the sound output is amplified within a frequency band set in accordance with the user's hearing loss characteristics;ii) the gain of the amplified sound output within said frequency band is dependent on the sound pressure levels of the incident sound; andiii) the output transducer produces substantially no sound output when the incident sound pressure level exceeds a set cut-off level, whereby the sound perceived by the wearer is almost entirely the result of incident sound arriving directly at the eardrum.