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Build Your Own Bluetooth Hearing Aid

Posted by michael on from the volume-goes-to-11 dept.

CloudShape writes "I've been trying to find a way to make a mobile phone work with my hearing aids for some years now, and I finally managed it a few days ago. Although the procedure itself is pretty simple, the surrounding issues are good for quite a bit of discussion."

20 of 161 comments (clear)

  1. The hooligans will have fun with this one by Samir+Gupta · · Score: 5, Funny

    Imagine the possilbities for bluejacking!

    --
    -- Samir Gupta, Ph. D. Head, New Technology Research Group, Nintendo Co. Ltd., Kyoto, Japan.
  2. Cell phone RF bad... Bluetooth good. by LostCluster · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Bluetooth is an important add-on to cellular technology because as hearing aid users clearly realized right from the start, there's a lot of RF coming out of that little thing! We hear about all of these questionable health risks... why are we even taking the chances?

    1. Re:Cell phone RF bad... Bluetooth good. by Earplugs · · Score: 3, Insightful

      I wonder how the RF from this would interfere with the existing technology in hearing aids to "sense" the magnetic field from a telephone reciever as opposed to listen to the actual audio waves. (Know as a T-P switch on most hearing aids I believe). Also, wouldn't your hearing aid technically not be allowed on commercial planes. How many people have been yelled at for using 802.11 and bluetooth devices already.

    2. Re:Cell phone RF bad... Bluetooth good. by rohan_leader · · Score: 5, Interesting

      I am a hearing aid user so I can comment on this. Being severely/profoundly deaf will get you exceptions in the rule.

      I'm certainly allowed to use my hearing aid on planes. Furthermore, I also own an FM system, basically a sort of wireless microphone that can speak directly to my hearing aid. Same 3 pin connector that the author refers to connect to a DAI shoe, btw. It is certainly handy on planes, and there are provisions in the rules that airlines have for disabled people.

      Personally, I've seen, as I've travelled with other deaf people, others use text pagers in the air to communicate. Definately, the rule is a little blurry when it comes to what technologies are allowed, but airlines do bend over backwards to accomodate us.

      And a word on the bluetooth issue. I heard from my audiologist that Widex www.widex.com is coming out with hearing aids with built in bluetooth. This was a while ago, so perhaps, they are out now. Not only can bluetooth be used to stream audio, but also to configure the hearing aid on the fly. Some hard of hearing people suffer from fluctuating hearing losses and used to have to visit an audiologist to get their hearing aid reprogrammed each time they wanted it changed. Now, we can use our bluetooth enabled devices such as PDA's and laptops to do this.

    3. Re:Cell phone RF bad... Bluetooth good. by rohan_leader · · Score: 5, Informative

      edit:

      Seems as if Phonak has their own deal called SmartLink. No sign of a Widex version like I said earlier, but again, it's planned but may not exist.

      I'm going to be looking into this since I have a Phonak Claro hearing aid that I bought a year ago. Finally can use those cellphones now!

      For those of you who are wondering, hearing aid users experience an extremely loud crackling sound when using the cell phone normally. If we use the telephone switch which make use of built in telecoils in some cell phones, a loud buzzing sound overpowers the voice coming out of the phone. It's very annoying indeed. Some phones, amazingly, do not have these problems. I once tried my friends phone made by Samsung, and it was amazingly clear! Just a bit of advice, in case, anyone was wondering :)

    4. Re:Cell phone RF bad... Bluetooth good. by gr8fulnded · · Score: 3, Informative

      I use a Kyocera 2035 without any problems. I'm profoundly deaf (HA model escapes me at the moment).

      The phone itself is a "brick" according to my friends that have new ones smaller then my thumb, but I'm hesitant to upgrade because it simply WORKS. I've used friends' fancy new Nokias and they just don't do the job. Crappy telecoils or something? I don't know, but my 3.5 yr old Kyocera keeps working for me...

      --Dave

  3. Obnoxious Friday reply, please disregard by TheDarkener · · Score: 4, Funny

    Can I hear you now? Wait, did I load the kernel module? Hello? DAMN IT!

    --
    It is pitch black. You are likely to be eaten by a grue.
  4. And the CIA can *really* radio voices to you... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    You'll actually need that tinfoil hat.

  5. You insensitive clod! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Funny

    I can't read this article, I'm blind!

  6. Great Work! by Mad+Martigan · · Score: 5, Interesting

    What a neat project. I've been thinking about the same problem for a while because my Great-uncle is going deaf. He takes out his hearing aids when he talks on a conventional phone (remember back in the day when you used to be able to get those big bowl-looking things that fit over the ear-piece to help make up for the abscence of the hearing aid?), but using a mobile phone is impossible becaues of the RFI.

    He is pretty old, so we would feel a lot more comfortable if he could have a phone with him at all times. I can't wait to try to build one of your devices for him.

    --
    ... turning to the 3-D map, we see an unmistakable con
  7. Where's a standard where we need it? by LostCluster · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Effectively, this solution is working because bluetooth uses a much lower power RF signal so the wire is not interfered with... he's just built himself a custom connection so that a hearing aid can be connected to the bluetooth tranciever.

    So really, all that really needs to be on the market for this to be a mainstream solution are A: Bluetooth adapters that connect to the phone and have a standard 2.5 mm output, and then B: an adaptor to convert that to a hearing aid-friendly conector. It'd have the side effect of letting all of us also connect our favorite handsfree piece to the phone by Bluetooth

  8. the new fad in the U.K by phaetonic · · Score: 3, Funny

    toothing with your ear piece! ouch.

  9. Re:what? by squidgyhead · · Score: 5, Funny
    Actually, I RTFA, and the first 10 lines of the article are written in ALL-CAPS.

    I found it quite humorous, really, clicking on a page about hearing aides and getting visually yelled at.

  10. Maybe It's Asking Too Much ... by SteveM · · Score: 4, Informative

    That you RTFA. This is /. after all. But if you did you would have seen:

    No amount of extension cable will make a wired hands-free usable - the wire always conducts enough RFI to cause trouble, regardless of any filters that might be in place.

    So connecting the phone directly to the hearing aid via a wire isn't an option.

    SteveM

  11. I also wear a hearing aid... by antdude · · Score: 4, Interesting

    I don't wear those standard/common ones that go on the ears. Mine is the bone conduction type with a headband since I do not have ear canals. I wonder how difficult it is to do this for this type of hearing aid.

    --
    Ant(Dude) @ Quality Foraged Links (AQFL.net) & The Ant Farm (antfarm.ma.cx / antfarm.home.dhs.org).
  12. Great idea... by Critical_ · · Score: 3, Insightful

    I was wondering if this guy has considered selling/giving his idea to the manufacturer of the bluetooth headset. This could always lead to a nice job offer later.

    On another note, does anyone know where to get that faceplate for the T68i in the following picture?

    http://www.gfern.com/btha/btha-complete.jpg

  13. woes of hearing aids by zanzibuz · · Score: 3, Interesting

    I have a moderate hearing loss, and have found that using cellular phones with my hearing aides is nearly impossible. I look forward to this technology and hope that it will eventually lead towards my being able to use my hearing aids and cell phone simultaneously. There are a few things that I have found work moderately well to compensate for the interference. I have a clamshell cell phone, a Samsung x-427. The clamshell design helps keep the antenna another couple of inches away from the hearing aide, and its enough to make a conversation tolerable. My old phone was a non-clamshell Nokia, and its interference was horribly bad. My hearing aids also have a background noise canceling feature that, when I turn it on, takes out quite a bit of interference. Unfortunately it also makes understanding conversations harder. I am left with having to take out my aids completely to talk on the phone. its quite annoying. For those of you who wonder exactly what the interference sounds like, check out http://commerce.motorola.com/consumer/QWhtml/acces sibility/hearingAid.html there are a few .wav files on this page which sound very familiar to me. Imagine those sounds blaring over every conversation on your phone. It gets to be where you just cant tolerate it anylonger. To my knowledge, only Nokia has an attachment for their phones to allow for use of the Telecoil. Information is at http://www.nokiaaccessibility.com/loopset.html. If anybody out there has used one of these, i'd love to hear your testimonial on how they work... Garth

  14. What's going on here? by 1000101 · · Score: 4, Insightful

    34 posts and not one response on how he was originally designing this for 50 pounds for patentable hardware?!?!? This is /. isn't it?

  15. Induction Loop? (much cheaper) by truefluke · · Score: 4, Interesting

    You didn't mention whether you were aware of an existing technology, but there's something known as an "induction loop".

    Being hearing-impaired myself, I obtained an induction loop that jacks into the cell phone. The signal is clear as day. Of course, you have to deal with batteries, but an advantage is, hands-free mode. There's a microphone portion where the cord forks into a 'Y'. :D

    I imagine the local Bell cell-phone store would carry it (that's where I got mine).

    Good luck.

    --
    spam, spam, spam, spam, e-mail, news and spam.
  16. Re:Am I missing something? by J2000_ca · · Score: 3, Informative

    RTFA - "No amount of extension cable will make a wired hands-free usable - the wire always conducts enough RFI to cause trouble, regardless of any filters that might be in place." Wires really transmit. I used some spare wire to wrap around my wireless to boast the signal.