How loops and other assistive listening systems work
The 4 things they do
1. Pick up the sound
The speech, music or other sound is picked up via a microphone or electrical connection.
2. Transmit the sound
This is done via a wireless signal of some kind.
3. Deposit the sound
There needs to be a suitable ‘receiver’ to ‘catch’ the transmitted signal.
Some signals can be ‘received’ directly by hearing aids.
4. Sound reaches your ear
You’ll experience the sound as coming straight into your hearing aids (or cochlear implant) or into the headset that works with the system.
When they work well, you smile
A properly working assistive listening system can make a huge difference. For many users, it transforms the experience of listening from a tiring battle into a relaxed pleasure.
Assistive listening systems all work in roughly the same way. They also aim to achieve exactly the same goal i.e. to help you hear better by directing good quality sound straight into your ears, either through your hearing aids or through a headset of some kind.
Learn more about each type of system.
Advice & training
Ideas for Ears provides advice and training to facility managers and customer care teams to assist them in assessing the needs of customers and service users.
Let us help you make a great impact.
Benefits of assistive listening systems
You can hear across a distance
- Even the best hearing aids can struggle to pick up sound that is more than a few metres away.
- They cut out reverberation as sound bounces around a room and/or booms out from a microphone.
- They cut out distortion which naturally happens when sound travels across a distance.
You can hear when there’s background noise
- Even the best hearing aids struggle when there is lots of background noise.
- These systems cut out the background noise and send only the sound being picked up by the microphone directly into your ears.
You may even be able to tailor what you hear
- Headsets and many types of hearing aids will allow you to choose the volume you want to listen at.
- It is often possible to also select if you want to hear only what the assistive listening system is sending to your ears or to select to hear ‘normal’ sound alongside it too.
- The most comfortable option will depend on what you’re trying to hear, the assistive listening system in place, and the hearing aids or headset you are using.