Speech and Noise Management:

A loud environment with background noise has always been a nuisance to hearing instrument users. As much as the conversation, hearing instruments amplify environmental noise as well.

Siemens has worked for years to attenuate background noise as much as possible for hearing instrument users and to positively influence the intelligibility of speech in such noisy environments.

Effective noise reduction systems are required for different situations like:

• Sounds created by a ventilation system
• Sounds inside a moving automobile
• Sounds on a busy street

Siemens engineers have continually developed speech in noise managements systems in hearing instruments. Many Siemens hearing instruments offer a new component in speech and noise management, SoundSmoothing™. Together with Noise reduction and speech enhancement, all three components consistantly active and operate parallel to each other for the best customer satifaction.

The animation below demonstrates how two components work together to alleviate speech understanding in noisy situations. The component "Noise reduction" takes care of stationary noise. The component "Speech enhancement" is employed when speech and noise are present at the same time. Together both components ensure best speech intelligibility in noise. Noise reduction and speech enhancement are available in most Siemens hearing instrument families.