Hearing Aids Can Help You Stay Connected This Holiday Season

The holiday season is quickly approaching, and for many of us, that means plenty of gatherings with friends and family. However, if you have hearing loss, holidays can bring about a sense of isolation and loneliness.

The good news is hearing aids can help make the holidays less lonely for people with hearing loss.

Hearing Loss Makes It Harder to Connect With Others

Most agree the best things about the holidays are not the gifts or the food (though both are certainly nice!), but the time spend connecting with family and friends. Whether you’re having a big family dinner at home or meeting friends for a festive cocktail at South Avenue Bar, you want to use that time to create special moments with those closest to you.

Unfortunately, hearing loss makes it harder to follow conversations, especially when there is lots of background noise and multiple voices speaking at once. This can lead people with hearing loss to feel disconnected at large gatherings and maybe even compelled to avoid socializing with others because of their struggles to hear.

Hearing Aids Can Help You This Holiday Season

A 2021 study compared two groups of people with hearing loss. One group was made up of people who were recently fitted with their first hearing aids. The second group’s hearing loss was left untreated. Researchers found that after six months, “social activity level increased and social participation restriction decreased significantly after hearing aid fitting in the intervention group compared to the control group.”

Hearing aids can make it easier to connect with others and strengthen your relationships this holiday season and beyond in a variety of ways, including:

Reduce miscommunication. Mistakes that come from not hearing or mishearing can cause a lot of frustration and annoyance for both people with hearing loss as well as their family members. Hearing aids enhance your ability to understand speech, reduce misunderstandings and strengthen relationships.
Suppress background noise. Many newer hearing aids have settings that can reduce background noise while enhancing the speech of the person sitting in front of you, making it easier to follow conversations in louder environments.
Ease tension. Hearing loss can increase feelings of anxiety, depression and general stress. When you feel more confident about your ability to hear and converse with others, you are naturally going to be more relaxed and able to tune in to conversations with your spouse or play games with your grandchildren.

Bottom Line

Don’t let hearing loss hold you back from enjoying the holidays to your fullest capacity. Call the experts at Center For Hearing and schedule a hearing test today.

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The Future of Hearing Devices: Deep Neural Networks & Artificial Intelligence

February 14, 2025

Hearing technology has come a long way over the years; however, one aspect of hearing loss that many hearing aids have difficulty addressing is trouble understanding speech in noise. Fortunately, some of today’s state-of-the-art devices can solve this problem utilizing deep neural networks (DNN) and artificial intelligence (AI). Sensorineural hearing loss causes difficulty understanding speech in background noise. This type of hearing loss is caused by damage to the hair cells of the inner ear that convert soundwaves into electrical energy, which are then interpreted by the brain. This causes the quality and quantity of the signal sent from the ears to the brain to diminish over time, resulting in the brain expending more energy and effort to make sense of it. DNNs may help improve the transmission of the neural code, making hearing easier on the brain. [1] It’s important to know what DNNs are to understand how they can help. DNNs are a subset of AI. They rapidly analyze large data sets so that they can teach hearing aids and other technological devices how to respond to data like a human would, all while verifying accuracy and making corrections. DNNs are beneficial in hearing technology because they can help with speech enhancement. DNNs can be applied as “time-frequency masks,” meaning select sounds—like speech—are allowed while other sounds are suppressed. DNNs can also identify and separate multiple voices, selecting a primary voice to emphasize and secondary voices to suppress. This feature can help hearing device wearers in a variety of settings. For example, at a restaurant or party, the hearing device can emphasize a conversation partner, allow other nearby voices at a reduced volume and suppress background noises such as dishes clinking. Schedule an appointment to talk to Center for Hearing about our vast state-of-the-art hearing solutions today— (239) 434-0086. [1] Published by Douglas L. Beck. (2021, January 15). Deep neural networks in hearing devices. Retrieved April 2, 2021 from https://www.hearingreview.com/hearing-products/hearing-aids/deep-neural-networks

Startup Aims to Develop the First Gene Therapy for Hearing Loss

February 14, 2025

A Boston biotech startup is attempting to develop the first gene therapy treatment for hearing loss. If successful, it promises to offer new hope to the estimated 300,000 Americans who suffer from gene-based hearing loss—a number that includes more than 4,000 newborns. The timing may not be ideal, but biotech companies have been largely immune from the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic and ensuing recession. Developing new drugs takes years, so these companies are better able to weather storms. And the efforts of biotechnology companies that are focusing on tools to prevent and treat potentially fatal health threats has resulted in soaring stock values for many of these companies, even in the face of the current crisis. Akouos, the Boston startup, was founded in 2016. Its goal is to develop the first gene therapy to treat hearing loss and is targeting a specific form of deafness that results from mutations in a single gene. They are experimenting with adeno-associated viruses, using them as vectors to deliver DNA that encodes a functioning gene in certain target cells. Around 7,000 people are afflicted with this type of genetic hearing loss. Adeno-associated viruses are considered viable candidates because they don’t usually cause disease and can be customized to treat a variety of genetic conditions. The company has partnered with two influential organizations: Massachusetts Eye and Ear and Lonza, a Swiss manufacturing company that holds contracts with various pharmaceutical makers. Manny Simons, Akouos’ co-founder and chief executive, holds a degree in neuroscience from Harvard College, a Ph.D. in biomedical engineering from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and an MBA from Harvard Business School. His desire to help those with hearing loss stems from his passion for playing the piano. “It’s easy to take hearing for granted,” said in a Boston Globe interview. “Maybe because music has been important to me, it’s something that I take a little less for granted.” [1] [1] Saltzman, J. (2020, June 22). Akouos, a startup developing a gene therapy for hearing loss, raises IPO value to $125 million - The Boston Globe. Retrieved June 30, 2020, from https://www.bostonglobe.com/2020/06/22/business/ipo-upped-akouos-boston-startup-working-gene-therapy-hearing-loss/