Binaural hearing aid system and a method of operating a binaural hearing aid system

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-11006226-B2
Application number	US-201816497251-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Mar 21, 2018
Priority date	Mar 28, 2017
Publication date	May 11, 2021
Grant date	May 11, 2021

Abstract

A binaural hearing aid system (100) with improved diversity properties. The invention also provides a method for operating such a binaural hearing aid system (100).

First claim

The invention claimed is:

1. A binaural hearing aid system comprising:
a first hearing aid, a second hearing aid and an auxiliary device;
a wireless inductive link adapted to transmit data packets between the first and second hearing aids;
a wireless far-field link adapted to transmit data packets from the auxiliary device and to the first and second hearing aid respectively;

wherein both the first and the second hearing aid comprises:
a relay processor adapted to relay data packets received from the auxiliary device, to using the wireless radio link, to the other hearing aid of the binaural hearing aid system, using said wireless inductive link;
a quality estimator adapted to estimate the quality of the data packets received from the auxiliary device using the wireless radio link and adapted to estimate the quality of the data packets received from the other hearing aid of the binaural hearing aid system using the wireless inductive link, wherein the quality estimation is carried out as a data packet validity check selected from a group comprising cyclic redundancy check, parity bit check and hash sum check; and
a selector adapted to select either a data packet received from the contra-lateral hearing aid of the binaural hearing aid system or a data packet received from the auxiliary device for further processing by the hearing aid, wherein the selection depends on the data packet validity check.

2. The binaural hearing aid system according to claim 1 , wherein the selection only depends on the data packet validity check.

3. The binaural hearing aid system according to claim 1 , wherein the relay processor is adapted to relay all data packets, received from the auxiliary device, using the wireless radio link, to the contra-lateral hearing aid of the binaural hearing aid system, using said wireless inductive link.

4. The binaural hearing aid system according to claim 1 , wherein the data packets are not decoded before being relayed.

5. The binaural hearing aid system according to claim 1 , wherein the relay processor is adapted to relay all data packets comprising data representing audio.

6. The binaural hearing aid system according to claim 1 , wherein the selector is adapted to always selecting the data packet received directly from the auxiliary device if the data validity check is positive, whereby selection of a correct mono channel from a stereo audio signal is ensured in case each hearing aid only receives one of the mono channels.

7. The binaural hearing aid system according to claim 1 , comprising a digital signal processor adapted to carry out the further processing wherein the further processing comprises at least one of the steps of:
decoding payload data, from a selected data packet, in accordance with an audio codec, and
processing payload data, from a selected data packet, representing audio in order to alleviate a hearing deficit of a user.

8. A method of operating a binaural hearing aid system comprising the steps of:
providing a first hearing aid, a second hearing aid and an auxiliary device;
providing an wireless inductive link adapted to operationally connect said hearing aids;
providing a wireless far-field link adapted to operationally connect said auxiliary device with each of said hearing aids;
transmitting a data packet, using said wireless far-field link, from the auxiliary device and to each of said hearing aids;
carrying out in each of the two hearing aids the steps of
using said wireless inductive link to relay the data packet to the contra-lateral hearing aid;
estimating, the quality of the data packet received directly from the auxiliary device, hereby providing a first data packet quality estimate;
estimating, the quality of the data packet received from the contra-lateral hearing aid hereby providing a second data packet quality estimate;
selecting, either the data packet received directly from the auxiliary device or the data packet received from the contra-lateral hearing aid based on an evaluation of said first and second signal quality estimates;
using the selected data packet for further processing, and

wherein the steps of estimating the data packet quality is carried out by performing a data packet validity check selected from a group comprising cyclic redundancy check, parity bit check and hash sum check.

9. The method according to claim 8 , wherein the step of using said wireless inductive link to relay the data packet to the contra-lateral hearing aid is carried out for all received data packets.

10. The method according to claim 8 , wherein the step of using said wireless inductive link to relay the data packet to the contra-lateral hearing aid is carried out without decoding the data packet before relaying it.

11. The method according to claim 8 , comprising the step of always selecting the data packet received directly from the auxiliary device if the data validity check is positive, whereby selection of a correct mono channel from a stereo audio signal is ensured in case each hearing aid only receives one of the mono channels.

12. The method according to claim 8 wherein the step of selecting comprises at least one of the steps of compensating the delayed receipt of the data packet received from the contra-lateral hearing aid and checking packet order information in order to ensure that data packets holding the same payload or that data packets representing the same time instance of a stereo signal are selected between.

13. The method according to claim 8 , wherein the step of using the selected data packet for further processing comprises at least one of the steps of:
decoding the payload of the selected data packet in accordance with an audio codec;
processing payload data representing audio in order to alleviate a hearing deficit of a user.

14. The method according to claim 8 , wherein the step of transmitting a data packet, using said wireless far-field link, from the auxiliary device and to each of said hearing aids is changed to only transmitting the data packet to one of the hearing aids in response to a trigger event selected from a group comprising: low power supply for at least one of the hearing aids, elapse of a predefined duration of time wherein data validity check for the data packet received directly from the auxiliary device has only been successful or has only been failed by one of the hearing aids, and wherein the step of selecting either of the two data packets is replaced by the step of selecting the only data packet that is available from either the auxiliary device or from the contra-lateral hearing aid.

15. The method according to claim 8 comprising the further steps of:
detecting whether a received data packet comprises data representing part of a stereo audio signal, wherein the stereo audio signal consists of two different mono signals, wherein only one of the two different mono signals is transmitted directly from the auxiliary device and to each of the hearing aids respectively;
predicting a first mono signal part from a missing or invalid data packet based on a second mono signal part from a valid data packet, wherein the first mono signal part is predicted as the output signal from an adaptive filter using the second mono signal part as input signal, wherein the adaptive filter setting has been optimized over time using an error signal based on the difference between the output signal from the adaptive filter and the first mono signal and wherein the adaptive filter setting is kept constant and used to predict the first mono-signal part, based on the second mono-signal part, in case the first mono-signal pa

Assignees

• Widex As

Inventors

• Krogsgaard Klaus
• Ungstrup Michael

Classifications

• H04R2225/55

  Communication between hearing aids and external devices via a network for data exchange · CPC title

• H04R25/552 Primary

  Binaural · CPC title

• H04R25/554

  using a wireless connection, e.g. between microphone and amplifier or using Tcoils · CPC title