3D printed hearing aids

jtkpenguin

Hi guys,
I'm profoundly deaf in one ear & very slightly deaf in the other.
Been wearing an aid in the bad ear for nearly two years & have had no problems at all with it, refuse to wear one in the other ear due to vanity!

I dropped the hearing aid & a piece broke off, I took it back to the shop & they say that it may or may not be possible to repair but as it's still guaranteed they'll send it back to mfr & see what happens.

Whilst I was there the guy mentioned some of the newer models were 3D printed hearing aids & would I like to know more...

Has anyone got or tried a 3D printed HA? what do you think of them? worth changing to or not?

lowelife

I could only assume from what I know of 3D printing its going to give a slightly better fit if you're using ear Moulds?
But then again they still have to do the fitting the same way, so its not going to be ground breaking different.

As for the rest of the aid its only going to be casing as well.
So assumptions only, I wouldnt be too surprised if most the aid is already made via 3D printing as its small and most likely cost effective in large enough volume.

jtkpenguin

Thanks for your reply.
Yes I'm using an 'in the ear' mould which, up until now has fitted ok, but although I can still wear it the piece broke off is making my ear sore.

I'm lead to believe from researching online that the 3D printed ones are far more accurately fitted because the mould is done via PC software & therefore more comfortable.

Just interested to hear other's opinions if anyone's tried one?

the_syco

I'd be interested in how they're made; is your ear scanned, or are they just scanning the mould?

lowelife

From my small amount of research it seems they are only scanning the mould.
Now if it was scanning the whole ear then I would think it would be a whole new ball game.

larko

lowelife wrote: »

From my small amount of research it seems they are only scanning the mould.
Now if it was scanning the whole ear then I would think it would be a whole new ball game.

That's right. The ear mould taken by the audio is sent to the factory and it is laser scanned and the casing is printed by 3d printer (CAMISHAA). Done for economic reasons. They used to be individually made by hand which cost a lot more but I felt they were a better fit when made by a human hand.

I saw recently a handheld gadget used to scan the ear I don't know anyone who has one in the business. If a laser can scans thousands of points on an impression I'm sure it can do same in an ear.

jtkpenguin

Thank you all very much for your replies, much appreciated.