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Hearing Impaired: Assistive Listening Devices

Hearing is a big part of communicating with others. For people who do not hear well, it may become difficult to attend social activities, speak with friends and loved ones, or attend classes. Assistive listening devices can give back this ability to communicate. An assistive listening device helps overcome hearing problems caused by distance, background noise, or poor room acoustics. These devices can be used with or without hearing aids.

Transmitters

A Personal FM system is like your own radio station. It has a transmitter microphone used by the speaker and a receiver in the listener's ear. This system:

reduces the effects of background noise
may be used alone or with a hearing aid
may be used in public places, such as churches or theaters
allows private listening to TV and radio, so the volume does not bother others.

Infrared systems are often used at home with TV sets. They work the same way as the Personal FM system, except that sound is transmitted using light waves instead of sound waves. They can also be used in settings such as theaters.

An audio loop system uses a wire on the floor that connects to a microphone used by the person speaking. The person talking into the microphone creates a current in the wire which makes an electromagnetic field in the room. A hearing aid can pick up the electromagnetic signal from the microphone.

Text Devices

Closed captioning is another assistive listening device. It is standard for TVs made since 1993. It shows text subtitles at the bottom of the screen.

Computerized speech recognition software is available. This allows a computer to change spoken messages into text documents.

Text telephones allow phone conversations to be typed and read rather than spoken and heard. This is called a TTY. Phone amplifiers may also be helpful. They can be built-in or portable units.

Alerting devices

Alerting devices include bed vibrators, loud signals, or flashing lights. These can be hooked up to alarm clocks, doorbells, telephones, smoke detectors, or baby monitors.

For more information, call the American Speech-Language-Hearing Association at 800-638-8255. Their Web site is http://www.asha.org.

Disclaimer: This content is reviewed periodically and is subject to change as new health information becomes available. The information provided is intended to be informative and educational and is not a replacement for professional medical evaluation, advice, diagnosis or treatment by a healthcare professional.

HIA File GEN4415F.HTM Release 9.0/2006