Technology Update SessionSession 2B While the MarkeTrak 2022 survey data indicate that more than 80% of hearing aid owners are satisfied with their devices, understanding speech in difficult listening environments remains a challenge. As hearing technology is transformed by machine learning, artificial intelligence, and embedded sensors, it is important to demonstrate how these advanced technologies can be optimized to enhance hearing performance and address real patient needs and deliver meaningful patient benefit. With the goal of helping hearing-aid users in difficult listening situations, Edge Mode+, an on-demand processing feature, was designed for Starkey hearing aids to provide additional signal processing to optimize listening experiences. When activated by the user, this feature prompts the hearing aid to analyze the current acoustic environment and apply specialized changes to the gain, microphone, and noise reduction settings to improve listening outcomes. This presentation will demonstrate the benefits of this app-based, on-demand processing on multiple measures of patient outcomes. Results will show how an on-demand processing feature like Edge Mode+ may provide broad benefits for listening effort and speech understanding in hearing aid users in realistic environments. Further, a review of patient demographics reveals that some specific sub-groups may see larger benefits than others, specifically those with greater hearing losses and older ages. In addition, the results of this study support using a multiplicity of measures when evaluating outcomes to gain a fuller picture of each participant's listening experiences.
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