Assistive Listening Devices

There are various online forums for QToDs, allied professionals and parents of deaf children, in the UK and other parts of the world.  BATOD manages an email forum for professionals linked to Deaf Education. The Scottish Sensory Centre (SSC) manages a Scottish=specific email forum for professionals.

Assistive Listening Devices and remote microphone technology can be used in conjunction with a Soundfield System.  The teacher uses the soundfield microphone and the transmitter is connected into the soundfield.  The sound is rebroadcast from the soundfield through the transmitter to the hearing device used by the CYP.

The Quality Standards for the use of personal radio aids QS12 states that:

Any deaf CYP should be considered a candidate for an assistive listening device.

The Quality Standards for the use of personal radio aids

Quality Standards 1 (QS1) states:

The purpose of an assistive listening device is to make speech/sound accessible in difficult listening environments for hearing aids and CIs, by reducing the effect of distance and background noise.  The assistive listening is set up and balanced before being subjectively assessed by the wearer.  Objective evaluation using speech discrimination tests assesses the benefit the wearer gains as well as their functional use of their listening package.

Assistive Listening Technology Working Group (ALTWG): Previously known as the UK Children’s Radio Aid Working Group, and prior to that as the FM Working Group.   This working group came into being in 2004 and is made up of professionals from Education, Health, Academia Charities and Manufacturers with specific interest in deaf children.  They meet online twice a year.  The Group’s principal aims are:

The equipment is getting smaller and easier to lose, discuss with your provider about replacements and insurance.  As receivers are often installed into hearing devices they are also lost if the hearing device is lost which can have a financial implication. However, this should not be a barrier to fitting and use.

The Assistive Listening Technology Working Group formerly known the UK Children's Radio Aid Working Group, working with the NDCS, produced the Quality Standards for the use of personal radio aids.  This is a resource for those who commission services for deaf CYP, practitioners who work with them and manufacturers.

In May 2022, BATOD jointly funded with William Demant Foundation, a revision of the BATOD Audiology Refreshers as an open-access resource BATOD.

The principles of setting up bone conduction aids and BCHDs with an assistive listening device are exactly the same as with a hearing aid.  However, you do need to have the correct adaptor to connect it in the test box.

The NDCS booklet How radio aids can help - A guide for families  has a section on connecting radio aids to bone conduction aids (page 16).