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  MRC DTP A patient-centred device to improve hearing aid satisfaction


   Department of Electronic and Electrical Engineering

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Prof P Gaydecki, Dr Michael Stone, Dr Rebecca Millman  No more applications being accepted  Competition Funded PhD Project (European/UK Students Only)

About the Project

“Hearing loss is a major public health issue. It is estimated that 33% of the world’s population over 65 years of age have disabling hearing loss (World Health Organisation). Hearing aids are the primary treatment for permanent sensorineural hearing loss. The National Health Service is the largest global purchaser of hearing aids, currently spending a minimum of £60M on 1M hearing devices per year. However, hearing-impaired listeners who are prescribed a hearing aid do not always use them: Approximately 30% of people who are prescribed a hearing aid cite poor benefit from their hearing aid as the reason for low usage. The underuse of hearing aids wastes NHS resources and has adverse effects on the quality of life of hearing-impaired listeners.

The aim of this project is to develop a smart phone Application (“App”) to help hearing aid users understand how to improve the hearing benefit derived from their hearing aids. This patient-centred approach will provide a user-friendly interface to direct hearing aid users to take practical steps to improve hearing aid benefit under different listening conditions.

The student will receive training in psychophysics, computational modelling and neuroimaging techniques to develop a smart phone App to help hearing aid users understand the likely benefit to be derived from their hearing aids in various listening situations. Computational modelling will predict the perceptual consequences of the combination of distortions introduced as the signal passes from the acoustic source to the auditory system of the hearing aid user. These distortions may arise from multiple causes separate from those introduced by the hearing aid or the hearing impairment, such as electronic processing (radio/TV, perceptual coding) or the different acoustic environments, such as the background noise at both the source and listener. Combining several pre-existing software models of speech quality and intelligibility, as well as models and patient measures of auditory processing, the App will additionally allocate where and why the primary degradation is occurring. Ultimately, the results of this project are intended to contribute to personalised treatment and increase confidence in the use of hearing aids.

http://www.manchester.ac.uk/research/Patrick.gaydecki/

http://www.manchester.ac.uk/research/michael.stone/

Funding Notes

Funding Notes
This project is to be funded under the MRC Doctoral Training Partnership. If you are interested in this project, please make direct contact with the Principal Supervisor to arrange to discuss the project further as soon as possible. You MUST also submit an online application form, full details on how to apply can be found on our website https://www.bmh.manchester.ac.uk/study/research/funded-programmes/mrc-dtp/

Applications are invited from UK/EU nationals only. Applicants must have obtained, or be about to obtain, at least an upper second class honours degree (or equivalent) in a relevant subject