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Closing the Open Fitting: An Effective Method to Optimize Speech Understanding

2019-03-21 White Paper
Matthias Fröhlich, Veronika Littmann

The Hearing Review, March 21, 2019

The findings of this research clearly show that the coupling system chosen by the HCP can have a substantial effect on subsequent speech understanding in background noise for the patient. The mean additional signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) benefit for a closed fitting was 3 dB, which corresponds to an impressive improvement in speech understanding of approximately 50%. This constitutes a significant advantage for the patient’s daily life in terms of social interaction. This benefit should not easily be foregone, especially in light of the clinically proven high acceptance of closed fittings based on the patient’s improved perception of his or her own voice as a result of Signia Own Voice Processing.

Read the full publication here.

Matthias Fröhlich, Ph.D.

Dr. Matthias Froehlich is global audiology strategy expert for WS Audiology in Erlangen Germany. He is responsible for the definition and validation of the audiological benefit of new hearing instrument platforms. Dr. Froehlich joined WS Audiology (then Siemens Audiology Group) in 2002, holding various positions in R&D, Product Management, and Marketing since then. He received his Ph.D. in Physics from Goettingen University, Germany.

Veronika Littmann, Ph.D.

Veronika Littmann is the team lead of R&D Audiology System Development Team for Sivantos in Erlangen Germany. She holds a PhD in Neurophysiology from Cambridge University where she investigated neural processing of temporal information in complex sounds.