an illustration of a person standing atop a ladder with a telescope in the clouds

6 Hearing Trends for 2023

in , ,

Keep Your Eye on These in the New Year

As an exciting new year nears, what can you expect in the world of hearing wellness? We’re taking a look at six trends to keep your eye on for 2023 and beyond.

1. Rechargeables

Aah, the convenience of rechargeability:

  • Less waste
  • Easy charge-and-go convenience
  • No fussing with spent disposable batteries that require removal and replacement

With an increasing number of hearing aid manufacturers offering rechargeable options for devices, it’s just a matter of time before they become the default. True, the smallest hearing aids that fit completely in the ear may not yet be widely available in rechargeable styles, but stay tuned. A breakthrough could be just around the corner!

2. Telehealth

The unprecedented global public-health challenges over the last couple years have called for adaption and innovation. An example: The rise of telehealth or video-based patient-provider appointments. Though not unheard of before the pandemic, telehealth rose in prominence as digital companies and others stepped up with apps and improved platforms to help keep health care accessible amid lockdowns, quarantines, and distancing.

One federal study of Medicare health care access showed a significant increase in patient telehealth participation during the pandemic — from an estimated 840,000 in 2019 to over 52 million in 2020. Overall, telehealth use has jumped 38-fold from pre-COVID rates. And with consumers and the industry embracing it even more as an additional option for effective patient-provider engagement, it’s here to stay.

3. OTCs

You may have heard about over-the-counter (OTC) hearing technology, a new class of devices in the U.S. regulated by the Federal Drug Administration and approved for those 18 and older with perceived mild to moderate hearing loss. OTCs are expected to soon join the market, representing a new option for some consumers exploring their hearing-health needs.

The good news? OTCs could spur more people to consider seeking help for hearing loss — a growing global problem expected to impact some 700 million children and adults by 2050. However, self-treating for hearing issues rather than seeking help from licensed hearing care professionals can lead to under- or overtreatment, making it important to get a comprehensive evaluation before deciding on solutions.

4. Noise-Induced Hearing Loss

Speaking of a growing global problem: Excess noise is one of the culprits behind an increasing risk of hearing loss among people ranging from preteens to mid-30s. Why? Popular activities such as using personal media players, hitting the club, enjoying a game at the sports arena, and rocking out at concerts can be lots of fun while also being hard on the ears — especially at noise levels beyond the danger threshold of 85 decibels.

Noise exposure is one of the most preventable causes of hearing loss. A few simple steps can help keep this harmful trend from gaining any more stream:

  • Limiting the amount of time exposed to loud sounds
  • Wearing quality hearing protection customized to your ears
  • Turning the volume down on personal audio devices
  • Staying atop your hearing health with annual evaluations

5. Connectivity

Whether streaming TV audio, jazz tunes, telephone calls, or your favorite morning-show radio duo, being able to channel sounds right to your hearing aids is pretty terrific. Essentially acting as headphones, the hearing devices make it easy to lean into the sounds you love — wirelessly. Plus, compatible apps make it a cinch to control your hearing technology right from your smartphone.

But let’s talk about the next level of connectivity. Imagine, for example, being able to directly surf the web, control access to your home, get instant ambient-temperature information, or turn off an appliance with your hearing device. Though these possibilities may not happen in the immediate future, the world of hearing-technology connectivity is always expanding to exciting new heights.

6. Artificial Intelligence

Netflix suggests movies you might love. Your household thermostat chooses a comfy temperature, without even needing to be programmed. Your smartphone accurately finishes your sentences before you’ve typed the words. Machine learning, a category of artificial intelligence (AI), is becoming the norm of everyday life, and we’re here for the ways it can support your health.

AI will increasingly play a role in hearing aid functionality, contributing to greater convenience and empowerment for users. One line of hearing aids already can track brain and body health, detect falls, and translate other languages in real time to help bust communication barriers. Look for even more AI capabilities as technology continues to evolve.

Hearing technology is always progressing to help you stay healthy, engaged, and connected with the people and activities that matter in your life. We’d love to show you the latest innovations, so don’t wait. Contact our caring team to schedule a test-drive today.

an illustration of tiny people working on a large computer monitor

Online Hearing Tests: Can They Help?

in , ,

The Era of DIY Health Screening

The do-it-yourself era of health screening is here, along with greater convenience and consumer empowerment. You can check your blood pressure from a pharmacy kiosk, test yourself at home for HIV or colon cancer, or even screen your hearing online.

But do online hearing tests work? Let’s take a closer look, including the pros, the cons, and the bottom line for keeping your hearing in top shape.

Some Pros

People wait an average of seven years before making an appointment with a hearing care provider once they suspect they might have a hearing loss. Imagine how much sooner they might seek professional help if that first step — a hearing test — could be taken at home.

In that respect, quality online hearing tests do offer some solid benefits. They’re:

  • Free
  • Discreet
  • Simple
  • Quick

Some might even provide a reasonable estimate of your current hearing ability. In studies of how several online or app-based home hearing tests measure up against the sound booth of a hearing care professional, though, results have varied.

Some Cons

No context

Even the most reliable online hearing test can be misinterpreted. If your results indicate a hearing loss, you need more context to understand the what and why.

For example, earwax buildup or debris in your ear canal could be the cause. It could be a symptom of issues in the sound-processing areas of your brain. But buying hearing aids online or at a big-box retailer won’t solve the problem — it will just mask the symptom.

Not Comprehensive

Many online hearing screenings are similar to the one you probably had in elementary school: You’re played a series of sounds through earphones, and you indicate whether you can hear a given tone. It’s called the pure-tone air-conduction threshold test, and it measures the quietest sound you can reliably hear at least 50% of the time.

This is important data, but it only scratches the surface. It doesn’t explain how well you hear speech, how well you understand it, or whether the hearing loss is due to an injury in your ear. Online testing doesn’t provide the comprehensive evaluation you need for a more complete look at your hearing wellness.

A professional evaluation includes an inspection of your ears to rule out physical causes of your hearing loss, such as earwax buildup, blockage by debris, or damage to your ear. Then a battery of important tests measures things such as:

  • How well sound moves through the air in your ear canal
  • How well sound is transferred elsewhere in your skull by your bones
  • Speech and word recognition
  • How well your eardrum moves
  • Whether there is a problem in your middle ear
  • How your middle ear responds to sudden loud sounds
  • Comfortable listening levels
  • And more

The Bottom Line

A reliable home hearing test can be an important hearing-health wake-up call, especially if you or a loved one is on the fence about seeing a professional.

But remember, it’s only showing you a symptom — it doesn’t pinpoint the underlying problem or provide solutions for your unique needs. Only an audiologic evaluation gathers nuanced data about your auditory system and offers ways to improve your specific hearing difficulties.

Are you noticing difficulty communicating in your everyday activities? Did you take an online test that indicated potential hearing loss? Don’t wait — contact our caring team for a comprehensive evaluation today!

Illustration of a silhouette of a human head with a brain - represented by a rain cloud - inside

Could Healthy Hearing Help People With Movement Disorders?

in ,

Could Healthy Hearing Help People With Movement Disorders?

Your ears and your brain are fast friends. In fact, it seems like a new connection is reported every few months. There’s even a growing body of research showing that untreated hearing loss is linked to dementia.

That’s why we encourage annual hearing checkups. Catching changes in hearing early keeps a host of other issues at bay. And we’re just scratching the surface of what we know about the ear-brain connection.

Your ears and brain are so well connected, in fact, that one recent study in Scientific Reports is based on a link the researchers discovered on accident. It’s a link that could improve the assistive devices used by people with movement disorders or limb loss.

Brain-Computer Interfaces

A research team called BrainGate develops brain-computer interfaces (BCIs). These are implants that use nerve signals in the brain to manipulate assistive devices such as prosthetic limbs.
Most BCI implants are put in a part of the brain that controls planning to act called the motor cortex. The BrainGate team wondered how workable it was to gather nerve signals earlier than that, though.

Could they use nerve signals from an area of the brain responsible for the simple urge to act — before the planning-to-act brain region gets involved? If so, they might be able to speed up BCI response times.

An Accidental Discovery

One clinical trial participant, because of a spinal cord injury, no longer had the use of his arms and legs. During a simple movement exercise that involved visual cues, his brain was monitored by fMRI. It showed activity in a certain area of this urge-to-act region of his brain.

They repeated the experiment with the BCI implant, instead of fMRI. To their surprise, the implant didn’t register activity in that same area.
But while reviewing data from a related research session, they found something equally surprising. During the movement exercise, when they used verbal — not visual — cues, the implant picked up strong signals from that same urge-to-act area.

A Study With Only One Participant

To the BrainGate team, it seemed like this urge-to-act area didn’t care at all about visual cues, only sound-based cues. They designed a new study using the BCI implant to test their hypothesis. It had a sample size of only one — that same spinal-cord-injury participant mentioned above — and the research alternated between visual-only and sound-based-only cues.
They found that the urge-to-act area responded to sound-based cues, but not to visual cues. They also found that the planning-to-act area responded to both, had no preference either way.
The results were published in Scientific Reports in the article “Auditory cues reveal intended movement information in middle frontal gyrus neuronal ensemble activity of a person with tetraplegia.”

Why It Matters

The BrainGate team has some successes under their belt. People with spinal cord injury, brainstem stroke, and ALS have managed to control a computer cursor simply by thinking about the corresponding limb movement. In clinical research, they’ve managed intuitive control over advanced prosthetic limbs. Plus, people with paralysis have enjoyed easy control over powerful external devices.

By discovering that this urge-to-act area responds to sound cues, they can use it as a complement to the planning-to-act area and BCI implants can gather movement data from two different regions of the brain. The researchers hope to one day use BCIs to enable reliable, intuitive, naturally controlled movement of paralyzed limbs.

And healthy hearing could be an important piece of this exciting puzzle.

Lineup of new ReSound ONE and AGXrH Technology

New Technology – ReSound ONE: Hear Like No Other

in ,

Hear Like No Other

There’s nothing like the sounds that make your life unique. A favorite playlist. Your sweetheart’s laugh. The newscast you love listening to while whipping up your signature smoothie. In today’s world, however, hearing the sounds of your life can feel more challenging than ever.

It’s why we’re excited about a new line of hearing technology that can help you hear the way you want — naturally. Introducing ReSound ONE.

  • Get closer than ever to a natural hearing experience with the microphone and receiver-in-ear option, which positions a third microphone in your ear to collect sound the way nature intended.
  • Enjoy up to 30 hours of superior hearing on a single charge or up to 25 hours of battery life with unlimited streaming.
  • Stream phone calls, music, and other audio right to your ears — wirelessly. Even enjoy your TV favorites without having to change the volume for everyone else.
  • Experience tailor-made hearing with the ReSound Smart app, including one-tap sound adjustments, geotagged settings for optimal listening, and more.
  • Gain the convenience of face-to-face online hearing care and anytime remote fine-tuning — no office visit needed!
  • Communicate confidently with technology that gives you everything you need to process sound with greater depth and direction, including:

In today’s evolving world, hearing your best matters more than ever. So don’t wait. Contact us to schedule your hearing consultation and personalized ReSound ONE demo today. We’ve made a limited number of appointments available and can’t wait to see you!

ReSound ONE

The personalized hearing experience you’ve been waiting for:

  • More natural sound and improved sense of space
  • Easier-to-follow conversations in dynamic environments
  • Best 1:1 speech understanding
The words NEW PRODUCT blasting through the bright blue background they're sitting on leaving a hot pink blast mark behind

Hearing Tech Roundup: 4 Gadgets We’re Giddy About

in ,

We’re always on the lookout for ways to meet your needs even better than we already do. These days, the world of technology seems to most often fit the bill. And we’re excited about these boundary-pushing devices that provide effortless, clear connection.

ReSound ONE

“Breakthrough” and “groundbreaking” are tossed around a lot these days. Especially when talking technology. The ReSound ONE, though, earns its accolades and then some.

Today’s hearing aids help a lot. In fact, they’re amazing mini-supercomputers. But the microphones sit just outside or behind your ear — not in your ear canal — so your hearing isn’t as natural.

Until now. This one-of-a-kind hearing aid uses an extra microphone inside your ear canal. With your ear’s unique shape, it collects and funnels sound organically – as only your ear can. You hear the way you’re used to hearing.

With this technological breakthrough, only available in the ReSound ONE, you can:

  • Hear effortlessly anywhere, even grocery stores and windy walks
  • Stay connected no matter what on video calls with family and providers
  • Enjoy a sound ecosystem using wireless streaming accessories
  • Recharge-and-go hearing aids last all day on one charge

Contact us to learn more about this groundbreaking organic hearing solution.

ReSound Key

ReSound Key features technology that allows your hearing aids to work together more efficiently, so you can focus on the sounds you want without losing touch with the sounds around you. And, with a full family of hearing aid models, there is a solution for virtually every lifestyle, preference, and budget.

With ReSound Key, you can also look forward to:

  • Hearing sounds clearly with less effort
  • Access to rechargeable hearing aid technology – no more tiny batteries
  • Direct streaming from compatible mobile devices
  • One easy-to-use app to individualize your sound experience
  • Optional wireless accessories to extend your hearing in any environment
  • Access to remote hearing care from the comfort and safety of your home

Whichever model you choose, ReSound always gives you a natural, individualized, and premium hearing experience, intuitively adapting to you and the environments in which you spend your time.

Oticon More

Oticon just introduced a brand-new hearing device that gives the brain more of what it needs to make better sense of sound, so you can get more out of life.

Oticon More hearing devices were developed to work more like how your brain works — they learn through experience. This is because Oticon More has the world’s first Deep Neural Network embedded on the chip.
As a result, Oticon More:

  • Delivers more sound to the brain
  • Increases speech understanding
  • Reduces listening effort so that you remember more of what is being said

With these devices, you can easily connect to your TV and catch a sporting event, show, or movie with your friends and family again. Plus, it’s powered by a rechargeable battery that lasts all day so you can talk on the phone or listen to music with confidence that your hearing device will keep up with you, even on the busiest days.

OrCam Hear

Recently OrCam, a company that develops assistive devices, showed off the OrCam Hear at CES 2021 in Las Vegas. So far they’ve focused on products for vision and dyslexia that use artificial intelligence and machine learning. Now they’ve entered the hearing space.

OrCam is a small wireless device that drapes around your neck on a string, and you pair it to your Bluetooth-enabled hearing aids. It lip-reads and analyzes body gestures to determine which person you’re trying to hear, isolates their voice, and streams their speech to your hearing aids. It intuitively switches when it determines there’s a new speaker.

It comes out later this year, and a price isn’t determined yet. You can sign up to receive updates about the product launch.

Illustration of men and women standing together, one in a wheelchair, using electronic devices

Tech Inclusivity Is Growing, and We Love It

in , , ,

Every year, the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) creates quite a stir with innovative new products and a window into potential trends. This year, the trade show — all digital for the first time in its 54-year history — leaned even more into inclusive tech, which helps everyone participate more in life.

Why does it matter? It’s all about accessibility, which is a big part of why we’re in the hearing care business. Better hearing helps people access more of what matters in their lives. For example, it:

  • Helps keep connections to loved ones strong
  • Reduces the risk of social withdrawal or isolation
  • Goes hand in hand with better physical and mental health
  • Supports workplace success and earning power
  • Plays a role in staying safe and alert

Some of the inclusive tech at CES 2021:

  • Smartphone apps such as HeardThat, which reportedly works in tandem with hearing aids to separate speech from noise; Aware, which may help those who are blind or with low vision navigate public spaces; and Sravi, which uses video, a word bank, and artificial intelligence to interpret lip movements.
  • The Nobi fall-detection lamp that not only can sense a fall — which is an especial risk for older adults and those with hearing loss — but can also send an alert for assistance and even help prevent slips in the first place through active tracking and reminders.
  • The Mantis Q40, a QWERTY-based Bluetooth keyboard that contains a refreshable braille display and works with compatible screen readers, making it easier for people who are blind or have limited vision to participate in the classroom and other activities without needing a separate braille device.
  • The Oticon More™ hearing aid, a groundbreaking rechargeable device designed to work more like your own brain does, so it can make better use of sound, require less effort to listen, and let you remember more of what’s being said.

This dovetails with our own focus on inclusive tech, including providing solutions that combine smart innovations with customized care to help you hear your best. Today’s hearing technology even includes options such as:

  • Fall detection and alerts
  • Language translation
  • Remote adjustments
  • Wireless streaming
  • Automated geotagged settings
  • Fitness-tracking for brain and body health
  • And so much more

Technology has come a long way to help you live a more empowered life, and the innovations will only improve. Want a closer look at what today’s modern tech can do for your hearing health and access to the world around you? Don’t wait. Contact our caring team to schedule a hearing evaluation and personalized demo now!

Ready to take the next step towards better hearing?
Contact us to book an appointment.

Call us today:

(289) 963-1512

Salus Hearing And Tinnitus Centre

Accredited Business BBB

Map of Salus Hearing and Tinnitus Centre

2200 Rutherford Rd #202, Concord, ON L4K 5V2