Surgery – Diagnostic testing – Ear or testing by auditory stimulus
Patent
1994-08-17
1998-07-28
Hindenburg, Max
Surgery
Diagnostic testing
Ear or testing by auditory stimulus
A61B 1000
Patent
active
057856613
ABSTRACT:
A hearing evaluation and hearing aid fitting system provides a fully immersive three-dimensional acoustic environment to evaluate unaided, simulated aided, and aided hearing function of an individual. Digital filtering of one or more signal sources representing speech and other audiologically significant stimuli according to selected models and digitally controlled signal processing parameters, including audio sources, spatializing coordinates, acoustic boundaries, signals representing one or more simulated hearing aids, and individualized body/external ear transfer functions synthesizes a simulated acoustic condition for presentation to a hearing-impaired person for objective and subjective hearing evaluation via an intra-canal prosthesis that is positioned in the ear canal, and that incorporates a microphone probe to measure in-the-ear-canal responses at a common reference point near the tympanic membrane during unaided, simulated aided, and aided hearing evaluation, thus providing measurements that are directly correlated across all phases of hearing assessment during the fitting process of a hearing aid. A virtual electroacoustic audiometer computes the electroacoustic parameters of a hearing aid based on the results of unaided audiometric evaluation and reference measurements that include the individual's acoustic responses near the tympanic membrane to acoustic stimuli in three-dimensional acoustic space. The system then synthesizes acoustic signals reflecting the combined selection of audio signal model, spatialization model, acoustic boundaries model, as well as computed hearing aid model in the case of simulated aided condition.
REFERENCES:
patent: 4118599 (1978-10-01), Iwahara et al.
patent: 4139728 (1979-02-01), Haramoto et al.
patent: 4219696 (1980-08-01), Kogure et al.
patent: 4759070 (1988-07-01), Voroba et al.
patent: 4774515 (1988-09-01), Gehring
patent: 4809708 (1989-03-01), Geisler et al.
patent: 4870688 (1989-09-01), Voroba et al.
patent: 5173944 (1992-12-01), Begault
patent: 5325436 (1994-06-01), Soli et al.
Chen, Joseph K. and Geisler, C. Daniel, "Estimation of eardrum acoustic pressure and of ear canal length from remote points in the canal,". Acoust. Soc. Am. 87(3), Mar. 1990, pp. 1237-1247.
Sandberg, Robert, MS; McSpaden, Jay B., Ph.D.; and Allen, Dan, MA; "Real measurement from real ear equipment," Hearing Instruments, vol. 42, No. 3, 1993, pp. 17-18.
"Selection instrumentation/master hearing aids in review", Hearing Instruments, vol. 39, No. 3, 1988, pp. 18-20.
Wightman, Frederic L., and Kistler, Doris J.; "Headphone simulation of free-field listening. I: Stimulus synthesis,". Acoust. Soc. Am. 85(2), Feb. 1989, pp. 858-867.
Wightman, Frederic L. and Kistler, Doris J.; "Headphone simulation of free-field listening. II: Psychophysical validation." Acoust. Soc. Am. 85(2), Feb. 1989, pp. 868-878.
Begault, Durand R. and Wenzel, Elizabeth M., NASA Ames Research Center, Moffett Field, California, "Headphone Localization of Speech," Human Factors, 1993, 35(2), 361-376.
American National Standard, Specification of Hearing Aid Characteristics, ANSI S3.22-1987.
"three-dimensional audio for PC-compatibles," The Beachtron, Beachtron User's Guide, Crystal River Engineering, Inc. 1993.
Zdeblick, Mark J., Ph.D., "A Revolutionary Actuator for Microstructures," reprint from Sensors, Feb. 1993.
Mills, A.W., "On the Minimum Audible Angle,". Acoust. Soc. Am., vol. 30, No. 4, Apr. 1958, pp. 237-246.
Rife, Douglas D. and Vanderkooy, John; "Transfer-Function Measurement with Maximum-Length Sequences," J. Audio Eng. Soc., vol. 37, No. 6, Jun. 1989, pp. 419-442.
American National Standard, Specification for Audiometers, ANSI S3.6.1989.
Jamieson, Donald G., "Consumer-Based Electoacoustic Hearing Aid Measures," JSLPA Monogr. Suppl. 1, Jan. 1993, pp. 87-98.
Mueller, H. Gustav; "A Practical Guide to Today's Bonanza of Underused High-Tech Hearing Products," The Hearing Journal, Mar. 1993, vol. 46, No. 3, pp. 13-27.
Mowrer, Donald E., Ph.D. and Stearn, Carol; "Threshold measurement variability among hearing aid dispensers," Hearing Instruments, vol. 43, No. 4, 1992, pp. 26-27.
Gauthier, E.A. and Rapisardi, D.A., MS; "A threshold is a threshold . . . or is it?", Hearing Instruments, vol. 43, No. 3, 1992, pp. 26-27.
Cherry, E. Colin; "Som Experiments on the Recognition of Speech, with One and with Two Ears," The Journal of the Acoustical Society of America, vol. 25, No. 5, Sep. 1953, pp. 975-979.
Cherry E. Colin and Taylor, W.K.; "Some Further Experiments upon the Recognition of Speech, with One and with Two Ears," The Journal of the Acoustical Society of America, vol. 26, No. 4, Jul. 1954, pp. 554-559.
Bronkhorst, A.W. and Plomp, R.; "The effect of head-induced interaural time and level differences on speech intelligibility in noise," J. Acoust. Soc. Am. 83(4), Apr. 1988, pp. 1508-1516.
Bronkhorst, A.W. and Plomp, R.; "Effect of multiple speechlike maskers on binaural speech recognition in normal and impaired hearing,". Acoust. Soc. Am. 92(6), Dec. 1992, pp. 3132-3139.
Begault, Durand R.; "Call Signal Intelligibility Improvement Using a Spatial Auditory Display," NASA Technical Memorandum 104014, Apr. 1993.
Decibel Instruments, Inc.
Glenn Michael A.
Hindenburg Max
LandOfFree
Highly configurable hearing aid does not yet have a rating. At this time, there are no reviews or comments for this patent.
If you have personal experience with Highly configurable hearing aid, we encourage you to share that experience with our LandOfFree.com community. Your opinion is very important and Highly configurable hearing aid will most certainly appreciate the feedback.
Profile ID: LFUS-PAI-O-18974