There are two common maladies that have faced humans throughout history. These kinds of maladies aren’t traditional in the sense that they put someone’s life at risk – like it was in the 1800’s with wide spread epidemics – but are moreover are detrimental to a person’s ability to function in day-to-day life.
The two are:
– Hearing loss
– Impaired Eyesight
At first glace, the two don’t look very similar – they both serve different function for the human brain – however they are similar in how they have been handled by both science and by the public.
Combing the Two – Eyeglass Aids
Back in the 1950s, and all the way through to the early 1980s, eyeglass aids were very popular. Essentially, an eyeglass aid was a hearing aid device that was built into the glasses (often, the technology was added to the temple piece of spectacles). The problem with the technology back then was that is wasn’t very practical. Due to the engineering of the glasses, as well as the limitations of hearing aid technology, people either had to wear both devices at once or not wear them at all. Also, the design of the glasses was very limited, often resulting in bulky and ugly pieces. For these reasons the eyeglass aid was forced out of production early in 1980.
Spectacle Hearing Aids
Recently, hearing devices in glasses have had a resurgence. One of the reasons for this sudden growth is because of spectacle hearing device. These eyeglass aids are worn by people who suffer from hearing loss but choose to take a more aesthetic approach in how the public perceives them; furthermore, spectacle hearing aids are perfect for people who can’t receive sound waves the traditional way, such as having an ear canal blocked, and need to ‘reroute’ the sound in order for brain function to continue effectively. For example, a spectacle hearing device may be perfect for someone who is vulnerable to infections in the ear.
Generally, there are two types of spectacle hearing aids:
– Bone Conduction: With bone conduction the sound is passed from the arm of the glasses to the inner ear via the bones. Because the process to transmute sound energy through bones requires a large amount of power, bone conduction spectacles are often very expensive.
– Air Conduction: The difference between bone conduction and air conduction is that the sound is transmitted through hearing devices connected to the glasses.
Loren Taylor writes for Hearing Aids Elite, which is an online retailer of personal sound amplifiers and digital hearing aids