Hearing Assistance

Speech-improved Telephony for People Who Are Hard of Hearing

Language is the most natural form of interpersonal communication. Communication by telephone over great distances is taken for granted by most people today. Nonetheless, hearing loss prevents 15 percent of the European population from utilizing this mode of communication in an unhindered manner. Even for persons with normal hearing or minor hearing loss, telephoning in acoustically difficult settings poses special challenges.

The telecommunication system, developed in the project, improves speech quality and lowers the required hearing effort for persons with normal hearing or minor hearing loss. It does so by reducing noise interference in real time. Additionally, corresponding signal-processing algorithms compensate in part for hearing loss in people who are hard of hearing. This enables these people to participate in natural communication, even over great distances.

Hearing Assistence: Integration of the Technology in Audio Equipment for Telephone Systems and Video Conferencing Systems
© Fraunhofer-Gesellschaft
Hearing Assistence: Integration of the Technology in Audio Equipment for Telephone Systems and Video Conferencing Systems
Hearing Assistence: Speech Intelligibility, Demo
© Fraunhofer-Gesellschaft
Hearing Assistence: Speech Intelligibility, Demo
Hearing Assistence: Audiogram on Different Hearing Loss Settings
© Fraunhofer-Gesellschaft
Hearing Assistence: Audiogram on Different Hearing Loss Settings

Funding

logo_bmbf_945_650
© Fraunhofer IIS
Logo German Central Innovation Programme for SMEs (ZIM)
© Fraunhofer-Gesellschaft
Logo German Central Innovation Programme for SMEs (ZIM)

The project was funded by the German Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Energy (BMWi) under the code KF 2329701.