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Why Are Digital Hearing Aids So Expensive?
sglines writes "Over the last couple of years I've been slowly getting deaf. Too much loud rock and roll I suppose. After flubbing a couple of job interviews because I couldn't understand my inquisitors, I had a hearing test which confirmed what I already knew: I'm deaf. So I tried on a set of behind-the-ear hearing aids. Wow, my keyboard makes clacks as I type and my wife doesn't mumble to herself. Then I asked how much: $3,700 for the pair. Hey, I'm unemployed. The cheapest digital hearing aids they had were $1,200 each. If you look at the specs they are not very impressive. A digital hearing aid has a low-power A-to-D converter. Output consists of D-to-A conversion with volume passing through an equalizer that inversely matches your hearing loss. Most hearing loss, mine included, is frequency dependent, so an equalizer does wonders. The 'cheap' hearing aids had only four channels while the high-end one had twelve. My 1970 amplifier had more than that. I suppose they have some kind of noise reduction circuitry, too, but that's pretty much it. So my question is this: when I can get a very good netbook computer for under $400 why do I need to pay $1,200 per ear for a hearing aid? Alternatives would be welcome."
Well, it seems like you have found an opportunity for a new business. Good luck with finding free engineering, manufacturing, marketing, and distribution services. Maybe you need to benefit from economy of scale. You may be able to expand your market by promoting free rock concerts at crowded subway stations.
WORKSHOP Advanced Computational Techniques, Algorithms and Numerical Methods for Modelling, Simulation and Optimization July 23-25, 2010 , Corfu Island, Greece within the 14th WSEAS International Conference on COMPUTERS Conference Address: http://www.wseas.us/conferences/2010/corfu/iccomp/ Special Session Address: http://stiinte.ulbsibiu.ro/info/info/cercetare/conferinte/ Program Committee: Kiril Alexiev , Bulgarian Academy of Sciences, Institute for Parallel Processing, Bulgaria E-mail: alexiev@bas.bg Dan Dumitrescu , University Babes-Bolyai of Cluj Napoca , Faculty of Mathematics and Informatics, Department of Informatics, Cluj-Napoca, Romania E-mail: ddumitr@cs.ubbcluj.ro Daniela Marinescu , University Transilvania Brasov, Romania E-mail: mdaniela@unitbv.ro Ioana Moisil , University Lucian Blaga of Sibiu, "Hermann Oberth" Faculty of Engineering, Sibiu, Department of Computer Science and Automatic Control, Sibiu, Romania E-mail: ioana.moisil@ulbsibiu.ro Dana Simian , University Lucian Blaga of Sibiu, Faculty of Sciences, Department of Computer Science, Sibiu, Romania E-mail: dana.simian@ulbsibiu.ro Special Session Chairman Prof.dr. Dana Simian Head of Department of Computer Science Faculty of Sciences Lucian Blaga University of Sibiu E-mail: dana.simian@ulbsibiu.ro E-mail: d_simian@yahoo.com Phone: 0040 744495407 http://stiinte.ulbsibiu.ro/info/info/cercetare/conferinte/ Conference 23-25 July, 2010 This workshop is part of the WSEAS CSCC, the annual convention and gathering of all the WSEAS entities (WSEAS Working Groups, WSEAS Technical Committees, WSEAS Editors, WSEAS Associate Editors, WSEAS Research Directors, WSEAS Projects Coordinators,etc...) is held in July during the CSCC. In 2006, the WSEAS CSCC Multiconference received 1302 papers and in 2008, the CSCC Multiconference received 1338 papers) Upload your paper now via http://www.wseas.org/#cscc INVITED SPEAKERS by WSEAS Lotfi A. Zadeh, WSEAS Fellow Joseph Sifakis, WSEAS Fellow All the WSEAS Publications in ISI (Click here), and SCOPUS (Click here)"
Yeah, people with problems and no money for insurance don't exist anywhere...