The end of the hearing aids?

To back up "Ducky": I've had similar results when asking people the brand or model of hearing aids they were wearing. By far, most couldn't remember what brand they wore and just about none could remember the model name, especially if the hearing aids were purchased more than a few months ago.

Indeed: the Chinese aren’t fighting ‘Coca-cola’ on this, or even an Apple or Sony Corp. It’s just a bunch of no-names - once the product hits near-parity in terms of performance, the price differential will do the rest.

As I alluded to above, the reality is that the volume providers (possibly with adjacent technology crossovers) will be driving this going forward. When the kind of AI that pulls the speech from a scrambled phone line takes-off and gets re-mapped into your hearing system (YeaSound like Abram said above): we’ll all benefit from the large language models’ ability to decide and recode words for improved intelligibility. They are already operating without the small market constraints of the conventional HA market.

‘Disruption’ is an overused term these days, however I agree with Abram that we’re at a precipice: the fact the Manufacturers have steered the industry to this point of vulnerability by the drive to RIC modularity is a little piece of irony that will probably get lost in the parabolic trajectory when the first ‘Big Distributor’ jumps the shark.

We all live in different environments. My hearing aids are chosen by audiologists or specialists. They follow guidelines established by workman’s compensation. Makes. Models. Price. I may get new hearing aids in five years. Or longer.

I select the specialist.

My specialist provided GN ReSound ENZO iA They showed up more quickly than I expected. I’ve been pleased

I’ve asked many seniors if they change their domes or wax guards. They didn’t.

I know this work is being done, but I don't know how soon it will be feasible in humans to treat age related sensorineural hearing loss, and I don't know about accessibility (cost, coverage, etc). 10 years is a reasonable guess, though I would say it may take longer. People were saying the same thing 10 years ago.

Cell-based therapies will require regulatory clearance and that means decent sized clinical trials with long term follow-up first. I think ten years is an underestimate of how long this will take.

The biggest cause of age related and noise-induced hearing loss is the loss of spiral ganglion neuron connections to hair cells which occurs well before the hair cells themselves die. Even with hair cell therapies being successful I think partial hearing recovery is a probable for many people which for many will mean continued hearing aid usage.

Such cell-based technologies will likely be offered at premium prices above the cost of hearing aids that a lot of people won't be able to afford. And why not? They'll have a limited treatment pool and won't want to eliminate their customer base without making a decent profit in the process.

At the moment cell-based regeneration research has gone back to the pre-clinical stage after a number of phase 2 trials resulted in poorer than desired outcomes. The soonest we can expect the end of a phase 3 trial if everything goes right is 7 - 10 years and 10 - 15 years is more likely.

Nuclear fusion will provide limitless power in approximately 20 years! Of course, they’ve been saying 20 years since something like 1960….

WH

Compare and listen to devices here: https://www.hearadvisor.com/best-otc-hearing-aids10

There’s certainly some bigger aids kicking around, though I’m not sure that they’ll be hitting the UP targets.

It seems widely (un-)acknowledged that the untapped OTC market is largely made up of ‘first timers’ with Mild to Moderately Severe losses. Anything that requires specialist fitting/individual moulds isn’t really part of the mainstream offer.

That said, I might have a pair of something with a chunky output that we were sent from one of the initial suppliers that we contacted. I’ll have a look tomorrow to see if they are still available.

I had heard this so many times. Come on Adam, dont you remember when everybody said , not apple is onboard is the end ..

There are some very cheap prescription glasses you can get at the pharmacy, yet Optical shops still exist.

Hearing aids are more complex, for once the bear minimum you need to fit the correct speaker size and dome. I have seen people fitting hearing aids on regular basis which still cant seem to pick the right speaker size let along the dome.

No doubt, the industry will have to have a better quality sound processing device for its basic instrument. This is good for us, not so good for the industry manuf

Hi Again,

in terms of performance with a bit of punch that you can Self-Tune (like I said above), the 5118H from Tomore is rated for an average max gain of 45dB (peak 55dB), which means that it’s in SP/UP territory. They are available direct from Tomore.net)

Your biggest issue is likely to be around the receiver size and seal - your kind of loss usually needs a functional mould, if you can get this sorted locally, then you’ve got the potential of having a working solution.

Cheers

OTCs are useful, but they can’t replace an audiologist. Proper fitting, counseling, and support still matter, so audiology isn’t going away anytime soon.

If you look at what Abram said, namely that the structure of the industry is getting to a threshold in terms of a paradigm shift. That doesn’t necessarily mean the demise of the Audiologist, but could (already happening) result in changes to the supply chain.

The stranglehold of the ‘big 6’ manufacturers is looking increasingly flimsy.

Hi Stephen,

I already have a pair of molds. The left has a 2mm vent and right has no vent. I can measure and put the tube on my own. No harm trying for my hearing loss.

Thank you very much and have a nice day.