Innovation Fund Award made to Chear and partners

Testing children’s hearing is challenging. At Chear, we have been finding that it is not always possible to elicit hearing responses in young children when using the simple sounds of traditional hearing tests, like warble tones. However, children will often respond when familiar nursery rhymes or theme tunes are used. Our working group is led by Audio 3 Ltd. with CHEAR and includes Guys and St Thomas’ NHS Foundation Trust, XED Ltd., and London South Bank University. We have embarked on a project to develop a novel audiometer capable of presenting and filtering music stimuli, to quantify hearing levels in young children. 

Through the development of this audiometer, we will be able to assess hearing levels more accurately and thereby improve treatment of hearing and communication needs. The music audiometer will reduce the need for repeated test appointments in paediatric audiology services, reducing NHS waiting times and will standardise the clinical validity of these stimuli.  The development of the music audiometer has been made possible through a grant from Innovate UK to cover costs of development, validation, and standardisation of hearing testing in young children.