Hearphones for Unilateral Deafness from Sudden Hearing Loss?

[lkingston]

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@Kimd37 wrote:

Hi, my 20 year old son is totally deaf in one ear. There is a setting on his iphone to have full stereo sound come out of just one ear bud. Would this be possible? To have the sound from all microphone devices pushed to one ear bud? It would be nice to have the option of turning off one side completely or sending all of the sound to just one ear.

There are very limited options for devices that address single sided deafness. My son misses a lot of sound on his right side, which is especially difficult in a crowded room. It is also a safety issue, not being able to hear properly or localize sound. He,too, just started college and these hearphones sound very helpful for a lecture hall or cafeteria.

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Android phones also have this feature.  Android phone will also let you do a hearing test and do custom curves and volumes for your left and right ears.  Then they will let you pick your usual ear for phone calls and use the settings for that ear when you use the phone without headphones.  It is one of the few areas where Androids are ahead of iPhones.

[lkingston]

Here is a page from the Widex hearing aids site which describes the feature that we all want so badly in our Hearphones:

https://www.widex.com/en-us/hearing-loss/types-of-hearing-loss/hearing-loss-in-one-ear

There is a link on that page which takes you to this more detailed page:

https://www.widex.com/en-us/hearing-aids/hearing-aid-accessories/widex-cros

Is there any reason why this incrediby valuable feature couldn't be done with a simple firmware update?

[OneEar]

You can add me to that group. I have not done much real time instrumentation type coding, but I am an experienced developer and software architect. I too would be highly motivated to help on such a project in any way I could.

I understand one of the challenges in developing BICROS aids is accomodating for the latency in transferring signals from one side to other, which must be something the Bose engineers know all about because noise cancelling is intentionally adding just the right latency. My guess is that turning Hearphones into a BICROS instrument is more difficult than might appear.

[Watney]

At last! Hope for those of us with single-sided deafness. Like @OneEar, I lost all hearing in my left ear from the mumps when I was in grade school. Almost 60 years later, Bose may offer hope for relief from all of those awkward moments of jostling for position next to my “good ear.” If your deaf in one ear, you understand.

Please, please, Bose. Let us hack the channels to route all sound to my good ear. The possibility of hearing with both ears is unimaginable. It’s emotionally overwhelming.

Thank you all!! I’m hopeful.

[DC Hearer]

I'm fascinated by the thread.  I've been deaf in one year since birth, and you learn to deal with it.  Although hearing in stereo will never happen, having some directional hearing would be a huge improvement.  I tried a pair of Phonak CROS hearing aids a few years back, and found the experience underwhelming to the point that I simply stopped using them.  Beyond the normal hassles of hearing aids was the fact that using the phone was a real issue.  (Now, everything is BT as we use VOIP through our computers.)  Plus, all the hearing aids really did was make a lot of confusing noise louder.  Whatever benefit I got from "hearing" on my deaf side was outweighed by the fact that there was no directional sense. 

I agree with the others who have posed here that a combination of directional capability (which the hearphones have) AND sum to mono would be a gamechanger.  It's be even better if one could pick the "blend" from the two channels.  That said, directional capability and the ability to cancel out noise from the sides may be enough to make the Hearphones a huge benefit to me in the right situations.

I remember when the Hearphones were first announced, but you could not get them as a regular consumer. Somehow, I found them again, and will try them for 30 days.  Hopefully, additional features like those suggested on this thread can be added through firmware updates (and not hardware updates). 

[Watney]

Please let us know, @DC Hearer how they work for you. I'm really curious. I haven't ordered (yet), but I keep checking the iOS App hoping to see a new feature for us single-sided deaf folks. 

[OneEar]

I suggest not waiting for Bose to add a special feature for monaural hearing. For me, with all its flaws, the present device has improved my life substantially, I've expressed in another message that I have suspicions that directing all the input to one ear may not be as simple as it appears. I may be all wet, but I would not want anyone to lose the substantial benefits I have recieved because they are waiting for something better.

At present, I am more eager to be able to use the device while it is charging and something to prevent the collar from migrating around my neck and pulling out an earpiece. Those prevent me from enjoying the benefits that the device already offers.

[ST - Hearphones]

Hi @JNSeader,

I apologize for not responding to your post sooner.

We engineered Bose Hearphones to improve the ability of anyone to hear conversations in noisy environments. Bose Hearphones are not intended to compensate for hearing impairment.

We are treating the requests in this discussion like all feature requests. We're listening. We care. And I'm sure you will understand, we cannot discuss what we're working on until we deliver it.

The best way to know if Hearphones will work for you is to try them and take advantage of the 30-day risk free trial.

Please let us know what you hear.

Sincerely,

ST

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@JNSeader wrote:

All,

I've been deaf in my left ear since birth due to a faulty cochlear nerve. In the last two years I have begun to lose my ability to hear higher frequencies in my right ear. I am 26.

I understand from reading these posts that the Hearphones do not accomodate for unilateral deafness, but why can't they? If the system is composed of four microphones, two ear buds, and a controlling app, why can't there be a setting that allows the end user to choose certain microphones to go to certain earbuds? And if the Hearphones have treble and bass adjustments, why can't the end user select to which degree certain frequencies are heard in each earbud?

It seems to me that all the materials are provided for a robust system to accomodate a great number of individuals with hearing loss at a cost much less than traditional hearing aids as well as more flexibility of use.

These settings could be unlocked to the user through the Bose Hear App, thus allowing them to fine a setting that best fits their needs in any particular situation.

I look forward to any answers to these questions,

JNS

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@JNSeader wrote:

Kevin_F,

Can one get access to the headset and Bose Hear App source code in order to make their own modifications to the way the system works? I understand that the company engineers may be busy doing other things, but as one who has a unilateral hearing loss, I have time and am highly motivated to find something that works to augment my hearing.

Thanks,

JNS

[DC Hearer]

Some initial impressions after using them for two days:

-BT connectivity could be better with an iPhone X running iOS 11.2.1.  I get the occassional lost connection (with the voice prompt notifying me of that) even if the phone is in my pocket, although it usually reconnects quickly, often instantly.  I don't know whether this is an issue with my Hearphone unit or the iOS or the phone, or the position of the phone relative to the where the BT antenna is on the Hearphone, but it is annoying.  If this continues, I'm going to exchange this for a different Hearphone unit.

-It's an improvement, and not magical, for my hearing situation:  no hearing at all in one ear/normal hearing in the other.  An improvement, however, definitely beats the heck out of the $3,200 CROS hearing aids that I no longer use.  In "focused" mode, it is far easier to listen to conversations in a noisy restaurant, particularly those occurring on my "bad" side.  Again, it's not magic.  It's not as if all environmental noise falls away, and all you hear is conversation, but that wouldn't happen with someone with normal hearing, either.  But I can make out conversations that I would not have been able to follow before without turing my head and cupping my good ear towards the persons speaking.  Hopefully, as I experiment more with the settings, performance will improve.

-Regarding the "sum to mono" comments in this tread, in "focused" and "front" modes, I am definitely getting input from my "bad" side.  Tapping on the earpiece on my "bad" ear confirms this.  But it is softer than when you tap on the earpiece on my "good" ear, so although it seems that there is some blending going on, and it would be great if you could manually control the input balance.  I'll keep experimenting with the settings, as perhaps the balance control will do that.  Right now it is biased (at 40) towards my "good" ear.  I'd ideally like to shut off the earpiece on my "bad" side while still being able to take advantage of the mics on that earpiece, to tailor the sound coming out of the earpiece on my "good" side.

-One thing that my CROS hearing aids do better is the sound of voices, including my own.  You can clearly tell that the sound of the voices are "processed"; they don't sound 100% natural.  Again, take that observation in the context that the alternative is not hearing other voices at all, so it's a fair tradeoff.  Again, an improvement, but not magical.

-Ergonomics could use A LOT of work.  I have a thick neck (19"+), thanks to years of weightlighting and neck bridges.  The unit basically is a dog collar on me.  I don't mind; it's not uncomfortable, but it's definitely not hanging loosely around my neck.  As others have observed, the unit tends to rotate, and once rotated, stays that way until you straighten it out.  This is Ver.1.  Hopefully, by Ver.3 these are two separate ear units like the Soundsport Free.  People:  Keeping buying these things so Bose or some other company has the incentive to keep improving the technology for folks like us!  🙂

-The biggest observation is that for me, I'd find the Hearphones very helpful mainly in a limited number of situations where my partial deafness is most noticeable to me.  The rest of the time, the hassles of the unit outweigh the benefits (or there are no benefits), so I would probably not use the unit then.  But in those situations where the Hearphones helps, I suspect I'll really grow to like the Hearphones enough to keep them and keep using them.  

-I am fortunate enough to have been able to just drop by my local Bose "showcase" store and buy the Hearphones.  They said that they are selling well, and that folks are driving in from different states to get them (why they don't just mail order them, who knows...).  Feedback at the store has been good.

-I'm mixed about the appearance issue.  People cannot miss that you are wearing these, and it's unclear how that would play out in a formal business setting.  Be interesting to see how that plays out.

Good luck to those considering these.  Will post more with more experience. 

[Watney]

Thanks for the great review @DC Hearer! You’ve convinced me to take the plunge. Who knows, but maybe I can leave the “ear cuppers” club behind.