• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to content
  • Skip to primary sidebar
  • Skip to footer
Behind The Mixer

Behind The Mixer

Learn Church Audio Artistry | Church Sound

  • ABOUT
  • CHURCH AUDIO 101
  • BLOG
  • PODCAST
  • GUIDES
  • CONTACT
  • START HERE

Can You Hear Me Now? An Assisted Listening Systems Overview

Topics: assisted listening systems, Gear Reviews, hearing impaired By: Brian Gowing April 10, 2017

assisted listening devicesTime for a five-second test.  How many people in your church are hard-of-hearing?  Time’s up.  You probably don’t know and that’s okay.  There’s a notable percentage of the congregation, especially among those over fifty, who have some level of difficulty hearing.  Whether it’s not being able to hear sounds unless they’re loud, or things sound muffled, or any number of other hearing impairments, chances are there’s at least 5% of your congregation with some type of hearing problem.

Common treatment for hearing impairment is a hearing aid and it used to be easy to identify these users.  They’d have something that stuck out behind their ear or they had what looked like a custom-molded in-ear monitor, both obvious to see.  Now, with the advancement of micro circuitry, most hearing aids fit deep into the ear canal or are so small that you can’t see them without sticking your eyeball close enough to risk getting smacked upside the head!

 

The Role of the Sound Tech

The sound tech, people like you and me, need to consider how we can help people with hearing problems.  One solution could be to turn the volume up (all about the bass, all about the bass, baddum-dum).  However, chances are you certainly won’t endear your church to those folks who wear a hearing aid because, just like audio systems are tuned for a room, hearing aids are tuned to provide clarity in the speech frequency range.  So guess what?  Anything that gets amplified overall, will certainly affect them substantially in that midrange frequency field more than someone without hearing loss.  This is why it’s better for the church to invest in an assisted listening system.

 

Types of Assisted Listening Systems

There used to be only two types of assisted listening device solutions, neither of which are cheap.  One was an FM transmitter with multiple wireless packs that people could borrow.  The other was the hearing-loop system.

FM System

Most churches that I’ve worked with usually have one of the FM systems from Listen Technologies. It’s easy to set up and easy to use.  All that’s required is a feed from your audio mixer of what you want going to the assisted listening devices.  That feed goes into the FM transmitter.  This is transmitted to the individual receivers.  This system does require a check-in and check-out station for the receivers but there is a down side; they’re small (easy to lose) and more than one has taken a dunk in the restroom facilities.

Hearing Loop System

More involved, though common in Europe, is the hearing loop system and in its most basic form consists of an interface box that takes a signal from the audio mixer, and then, instead of transmitting the signal wirelessly, transmits the signal through a closed induction loop of wire.

So what’s involved in implementing this type of system is to determine a place to run the induction loop wire, how much of your building you want to cover with the induction loop, and how big a transmitter you need to cover the area. As long as the hearing impaired person has a hearing aid with a T-Coil (most hearing aids do unless really old) then their hearing aid will pick up the signal from the hearing loop. They don’t have to do a thing. It’s a passive device as far as users are concerned.

Technology in 2017: More Options

If you check out the Listen Technologies website, https://www.listentech.com/, you’ll see a few more options.  For example, there are now smartphone systems that utilize Wi-Fi to transmit the signal.  The hearing loop systems have now gone digital with Dante interfaces.  There are IR-based systems and something called iDSP RF systems.

 

The Takeaway

Making it easy for the hearing impaired to enjoy church reaps benefits for everyone involved.  If you’re starting a building project and want the most seamless way to help out your hard-of-hearing folks then implement a hearing loop system.  Just remember that you’ll need to take into account how big an area you’re going to want to cover.  If you want a lot of flexibility look at some of the FM, IR or RF models.  You should educate yourself on what’s out there and what the different systems offer.

The Next Step

Check out the below web sites for more information on assisted hearing systems.

  • Listen Technologies
  • Hearing Loop.Org
  • Home Hearing Loop  (A quick primer on what a hearing loop system looks like installed for a house)

Filed Under: Gear Tagged With: assisted listening systems, Gear Reviews, hearing impaired

Reader Interactions

Thought? Questions? Comments? Cancel reply

Notify me of followup comments via e-mail. You can also subscribe without commenting.

Comments

  1. Andrew says

    May 1, 2017 at 9:46 am

    My church has people that do sign language. I’m sure it’s tiresome for them and possibly embarrassing for the people who are in the section for hearing impaired. I think ill turn the pastor to this and see what he thinks.

    Reply
  2. John B says

    April 15, 2017 at 5:06 am

    Hi (from the UK)
    A couple of pointers for those considering a hearing aid loop – this works by creating a magnetic field, so electric guitars pick-ups etc will pick up the the loop transmission and can result in feedback! This can be overcome by careful design of the loop to reduce loop signal strength in the stage area. We also only send the spoken word to the hearing loop amp (from mixer matrix or group output).
    We also have overhead power lines along one side of the church, and although the local electricity company has been helpful in minimising the magnetic field from the lines, this results in a background buzz on hearing aids using the T-position.

    Reply

Primary Sidebar

35,000+ Members

Get the Guides

Audio Essentials for Church Sound
Audio Essentials for Mixing Vocals
Equipping Your Small Church for Audio

Talk with Chris

Audio Essentials for Church Sound

Article Directory

  • Visit the Directory

Featured In…

  • church production magazine
  • live sound magazine
  • pro sound web
  • technology for worship magazine
  • worship leader magazine

Footer

Resources

About Chris
Blog
Podcast
Guides
Toolbox
Talk with Chris
Contact
Academy Sign In

Article Categories

Mixing Skills
Monitor Mixing
Equipment Usage
Gear Reviews
Leading a Team
Your Health

SEARCH

  • Email
  • Twitter

Behind The Mixer · Church Sound | Disclosure and Privacy
Copyright © 2023 Tiger Green Productions, LLC. - All Rights Reserved.