Broadcasting to hearing aid using dancers

Question and Answer
#1

I recently joined a Square Dance Club. One of my friends is a Caller (Plays the tunes and calls out the dancers’ moves).

He expressed an interest in buying a machine to broadcast the calls and music to dancers.

I told him about T-Coil systems, Blue Tooth (proprietary systems) and the upcoming Auracast Blue Tooth system.

He indicated he has found information on Blue Tooth systems but “they have a delay.” And on FM systems as well, which he may prefer because it appears they have less delay.

Dancing to music without instruction is relatively easy. Adding in movement instructions (e.g. “Sides Face, Grand Square!” or Alemand Left…) over a speaker system is harder. Particularly when some callers have hearing issues but do not use hearing aids and turn the volume up so that they can hear.

So, is there a broadcast system that is both portable and readily usable with commonly used brands of hearing aids? If so, what is it? Have you used it as a Dancer or a Caller? and is it effective? If it is an FM system, how would that work with commonly used aids?

Thanks for your assistance in this matter.

#2

These days, very few hearing aids have “T” coils.
Maybe a system like in some churches, where each person wears a pick-up device.

#3

Thank you, I knew that but appreciate your response.

Do you have experience with FM or Blue Tooth broadcast systems for crowds?

#4

For remote listening, the options are FM, telecoil, and Bluetooth.

FM requires the listening devices to have an FM receiver, and this is not very common in modern devices, at least built-in. To @Speedskater’s point, churches will hand out headphones, and I think that kind of system is probably the most simple and feasible, although it has nothing to do with hearing aids.

Telecoil is more common, although definitely waning. Telecoils are available in at least some Oticon, Phonak, and Widex devices for sure without digging too deep. This does require the venue to be looped, though.

Bluetooth is the most recent, but Bluetooth Classic streaming is one-to-one i.e. not broadcast to several users. This is where Bluetooth LE Audio and Auracast come in, as it uses Bluetooth to broadcast audio to several devices. The VOCE from Nexum is, according to their marketing, is the world’s first Bluetooth LE Audio transceiver. Theoretically, if the Caller wore a microphone hooked up to one of these he or she could transmit his or her voice to LE Audio receiving devices, such as currently Oticon Intent, Resound Nexia, and Jabra Enhance Pro 20 devices. I personally do not have any experience with the LE Audio capabilities of those hearing aids, so I’d be very interested in other voices on this forum concerning that.

#5

We tried Moer’s Auracast models, MoerLink and MoerDuo. No fn good.
I tried to contact mfg twice and they did not respond. The MDuo is either transmit or receive, the MLink it PC USB dongle transmit only.

I sent them back and they wanted me to tell them what was wrong. I don’t mind being an early adopter of technology. I have been doing that since the first PCs came out.

They won’t connect to receive on an android Samsung 23 (supposed to support Auracast). They won’t transmit from either a Windows 10 or 11.

They’re bleeding edge crap. The firm uses customers to test their products.

Not recommended.

1 Like
#6

Nowadays it’s mostly personal portable transmitters. Like the ones you get in museums, or in planetariums. Wired earbuds with tiny receiver attached; it’s fm.
Of course it’s not great for hearing impaired folks and it won’t be until Auracast get more widespread. Auracast is Bluetooth too, but there’s no perceptible delay.