A hearing system includes a hearing instrument for capturing a sound signal from an environment of the hearing instrument. The captured sound signal is processed, and the processed sound signal is output to a user of the hearing instrument. In a speech recognition step, the captured sound signal is analyzed to recognize speech intervals, in which the captured sound signal contains speech. In a speech enhancement procedure performed during recognized speech intervals, the amplitude of the processed sound signal is periodically varied according to a temporal pattern that is consistent with a stress rhythmic pattern of the user. A method for operating the hearing instrument is also provided.

A hearing assistance device for informing about the state of a wearer includes: an input part configured to receive a selection input for either an ambient listening function or a music listening function; at least one microphone configured to pick up ambient sound; a speaker configured to send the ambient sound to the wearer; a communication part configured to perform wired or wireless communication with an external electronic communication device; an indication part configured to indicate that the ambient listening function or the music listening function is being performed; and a controller configured to perform the ambient listening function to pick up ambient sound from the microphone according to a selection input from the input part and send the ambient sound to the speaker, or perform the music listening function to play stored music or music received from the communication part and send the music to the speaker.

Disclosed herein, among other things, are methods and apparatus for hearing assistance devices, and in particular to behind the ear and receiver in canal hearing aids with distributed processing. One aspect of the present subject matter relates to a hearing assistance device including hearing assistance electronics in a housing configured to be worn above or behind an ear of a wearer. The hearing assistance device includes an ear piece configured to be worn in the ear of the wearer and a processing component at the ear piece configured to perform functions in the ear piece and to communicate with the hearing assistance electronics, in various embodiments.

The disclosure generally relates to a method, system and apparatus to improve a user's understanding of speech in real-time conversations by processing the audio through a neural network contained in a hearing device. The hearing device may be a headphone or hearing aid. In one embodiment, the disclosure relates to an apparatus to enhance incoming audio signal. The apparatus includes a controller to receive an incoming signal and provide a controller output signal; a neural network engine (NNE) circuitry in communication with the controller, the NNE circuitry activatable by the controller, the NNE circuitry configured to generate an NNE output signal from the controller output signal; and a digital signal processing (DSP) circuitry to receive one or more of controller output signal or the NNE circuitry output signal to thereby generate a processed signal; wherein the controller determines a processing path of the controller output signal through one of the DSP or the NNE circuitries as a function of one or more of predefined parameters, incoming signal characteristics and NNE circuitry feedback.

Hearing device and method of power estimation and/or pulse detection in a hearing device is disclosed. The method comprises obtaining a pulse input signal; determining if the pulse input signal satisfies a first rising criterion; in accordance with the input signal satisfying the first rising criterion, increasing a threshold; determining if the pulse input signal satisfies a first down count criterion; in accordance with the pulse input signal satisfying the first down count criterion, initializing a down counter; determining if the down counter satisfies a second down count criterion; in accordance with the down counter satisfying the second down count criterion, decreasing the down counter; determining if the down counter satisfies a pulse detection criterion; and in accordance with the down counter satisfying the pulse detection criterion, outputting a pulse output signal indicative of detection of a pulse.

A hearing device component (6) comprises a sensor-unit (8) for receiving an audio-signal (AS), a separation device (9) for separating part-signals (PS.sub.i) from the audio-signal (AS), a classification device (10) for classifying the part-signals (PS.sub.i) separated from the audio-signals (AS), and a modulation device (11) for modulating the part-signals (PS.sub.i), wherein the classification device (10) is communicatively coupled to the modulation device (11) and wherein the modulation device (11) is designed to enable a concurrent modulation of different part-signals (PS.sub.i) with different modulation-functions depending on their classification.

An exemplary system includes a memory storing instructions and a processor communicatively coupled to the memory and configured to execute the instructions to determine that an audio streaming session is to be initiated in which an audio signal is streamed to a hearing device, provide, based on the determining that the audio streaming session is to be initiated, an option for a user to select an ambient sound attenuation setting for use by the hearing device during the audio streaming session, detect a selection by the user of the option; and direct, based on the user selecting the option, the hearing device to initiate the audio streaming session and attenuate, in accordance with the ambient sound attenuation setting, ambient sound during the audio streaming session.

A hearing system comprises a hearing device worn on the head, or fully or partially implanted in the head, of a user, and external audio transmitters. The hearing system allows wireless communication to be established between the hearing device and the audio transmitters. The hearing device comprises microphones providing respective electric input signals; a beamformer filter providing a beamformed signal from the electric input signals; and an output unit. The hearing system further comprises a selector/mixer for selecting and possibly mixing one or more of the electric input signals or the beamformed signal and external electric signals from the audio transmitters, and providing a current input sound signal based thereon for presentation to the user. The selector/mixer is controlled by a source selection processor, which determines the source selection control signal based on a comparison of the beamformed signal and the external electric sound signals or processed versions thereof.

This invention provides a new and improved hearing aid system with high quality noise cancellation method and devices to overcome the limitations and difficulties encountered in conventional technologies. The technical limitations of the noise uncertainty and speech distortion in the hearing aid field are resolved by restoration of the high-quality speech by converting the speech content into an intermediate linguistic representation and by synthesizing the speech of the same speaker with pre-trained using artificial intelligence (AI) modules. In this invention, the noise uncertainties are circumvented by focusing on the target speaker or picking up the dominant speech by choosing the corresponding setting assuming the speech from the target speaker is the dominant speech based on the Lombard effect.

A hearing aid system for generating processed audio signals may include at least one processor. The processor may be configured to receive an audio signal representative of the sounds captured by the at least one microphone; generate a processed audio signal based on analysis of the audio signal; determine a quality degradation of at least one aspect of the processed audio signal; and provide an auditory cue to the user indicating the quality degradation.