Hearing aid adjustment software with tablet support (my idea and the reason why)

An Android tablet is not needed as if the audiologist has a Microsoft Surface Pro, this is capable of behaving like a tablet and runs Windows and uses ARM chips.

Your audiologist goes to the park with you???

I realize that the programs have to be written for ARM.

Aren’t there Surface tablets that have Intel X86 chips?

you are right, there is. I’m not from America, so surface tablets in my country in Europe are not that available and not affordable. That’s why I’m more for Android.

It doesn’t seem practical or cost efficient to me. Why not just bring in a recording to your fitting section?

@markoo355 said:

As an example, we go to the park together with the audiologist and he has a tablet next to him and looks at the options. We tell him, turn up this and that sound, I don’t understand children well, it’s very noisy, your speech when you speak to me is insufficiently intelligible, tinny, deep, etc. It means that the audiologist immediately sees where the problem is and immediately solves it. So it could save the audiologist time to identify the problem.

I remember that many hearing aid brands have remote support functions. The audiologist can use a mobile phone to remotely connect to a computer in his office and activate the remote support function of the hearing aid fitting software from anywhere to adjust your hearing aids.

It’s not about this architecture or that architecture. It’s about how much control the hearing aid industry is prepared to give the user. And the answer is ‘not much’. The whole basis of the industry is a professional who programs the device for the user.

Start putting more powerful tools in the hands of users, and that arrangement is threatened. The user asks ‘If I can do this much, why not a little bit more?’ You can understand the audiologist’s point of view in some ways. You send your client off with a programmed hearing instrument. You really don’t want them coming back at their next visit with an instrument with altered programming. And let’s face it. No audiologist is going to go down the park with you, or the pub.

What we have is a simple business model. And it’s entrenched and profitable. I’ve often thought in my idle moments that a collaborative model would move things forward. Audiologist sends you off with your hearing aids and clear instructions on what to listen for and, yes, with a tablet that allows you to make changes systematically and with an audit trail for the audiologist. You bring the tablet with you to the next visit and discussions ensue. Audiologist as hearing coach.

I read somewhere about trials undertaken in some Nordic country. Participants were given devices that automatically recorded details of the various sound scenes they encountered. Participant were asked to evaluate the performance of their aids at regular intervals- on their phones I believe. The two sets of data were correlated in various ways. The idea was to develop a new service model based on evaluation of real world performance. That’s all I remember. Sorry.

But yes, I think we can do better than the current model.

There is one example of the audiologist going to a restaurant with a client to fine-tune the client’s hearing aid. It’s in a book about hearing and hearing aids (written by David Owen).
He tells of an investment banker who takes his audiologist to a top level restaurant (while paying by the hour).
The lure is a restaurant the audiologist could not normally afford and being paid hourly at the same time - a pub can’t compete with that.

@markoo355 said:

It doesn’t have to be a park, it can be any public place to get out of the quiet office where it’s harder to find out which sound needs to be changed. One of the reasons why this is not done is because the configuration of hearing aids is insufficiently practical

I doubt that’s one of the reasons.

I’d bet that the main reason it isn’t done is that it would be beyond impractical for a provider to be traipsing around the countryside trying to find a specific environment that the customer wants to tune. How would they plan for that? How would that time get paid for?

Every audiologist (and really, every optometrist, family doctor, allergist, or other specialist) that I have ever worked with operates out of an office. That office has the tools and supplies they need to perform their services. That office also creates the convenience of knowing where to find that provider. The provider schedules appointments based on how many patients they expect to be able to see in a day, and I would imagine that number is based on their experience with the amount of time an average appointment takes.

Meeting us somewhere outside of the office might sound good to us, at least at first blush… but you are asking for adjustments to be made in an uncontrolled, unrepeatable sound environment. That’s not a good model.

I get just as frustrated as the next guy - and I have shared that frustration with my audiologists - about the unrealistic sound environment in their office. What sounds “good” in a 10’x15’ office when spoken by someone who has trained to speak slowly and clearly, doesn’t really help me in a bowling alley or restaurant. But they are a business, and have to be able to meet business goals. Or they won’t be in business at all.

Given all of that, the lack of a portable form factor for making adjustments in real time can’t be high on the list of hurdles that we face.

Luckily, the communication device for programming most current hearing aids is relatively accessible, and the fitting software for most brands can be found if you know where to look. Loading the software on a laptop will let you take it to the park, or a restaurant, or wherever you want - and make whatever adjustments make you happy.

I think it is the responsibility of the manufacturer to do the testing in many real world environments. They can’t go to every pub or restaurant etc. But they should be able to get a good example to simulate the environment. Then add that to their fitting software so it can be recreated in the sound booth. Then it could be tested against your fitting. That would be a good starting point.

If they already do this it is obvious they need to try harder. And train the fitters better.

Thanks

My opinion.
The average person doesn’t think about going to the pub/restaurant, wherever and having the aids adjusted.
I also doubt they would be willing to pay for it.
I always believed the average person after a day are two goes home and puts them in a drawer.