Interview with Tammy Zirke, Audiology/Tech Support, Bernafon

Topic: ChannelFree™ Amplification, Hearing Aid Colors for Football Season, and Some Interesting Things You May not Know About Bernafon

Tammy Zirke

SMAKA: Today I'm speaking with Tammy Zirke from Bernafon. Welcome, Tammy.

ZIRKE: Thanks, Carolyn, glad to be here.



SMAKA: Our topic today is a proprietary Bernafon technology, ChannelFree™. But before we start, can you tell me about your background and your role at Bernafon?

ZIRKE: Absolutely. I received my undergrad and my graduate degrees in audiology at Ohio University and then Kent State University respectively, and then completed my Au.D. at Salus University in 2006. I spent my first 4 years out of grad school at a teaching hospital in Toledo, I decided to make a move to the manufacturing side of the industry. I spent 4 years at another hearing aid manufacturer before joining Bernafon in 2008. Currently I work in audiology and tech support and also am involved in customer trainings.

SMAKA: Thanks, Tammy. Now let's get into ChannelFree™. Can you give an overview of what it is?

ZIRKE: Sure, absolutely. In May, we introduced Vérité, which is our second-generation of ChannelFree™ digital signal processing. ChannelFree™ is an exclusive and proprietary technology to Bernafon. You won't find it anywhere else.

Interestingly, when the first generation of ChannelFree™ came out in 2002, it was marketed as a musician's hearing instrument and it was incredibly successful for that niche. But the benefit that people were clamoring about was the ability to understand speech. So this time around with Vérité and the second generation of ChannelFree, that's been the focus of our message - but customers still tell us they love ChannelFree technology for those musicians!

In a nutshell though, it works like this: ChannelFree™ continuously adjusts the gain of the hearing instrument in order to amplify each phoneme individually. It does this without dividing the incoming signal into the fixed bands or channels, as you would have in a traditional multichannel digital signal processing system.

SMAKA: So, what happened to the idea that more channels is better? [laughs]

ZIRKE: [laughs]. Yes, I refer to that as The Great Channel War.

ChannelFree™ actually allows each and every phoneme to be amplified. Oftentimes in multichanneled systems with fast-acting compression, some phonemes that have less energy or are very short phonemes can get lost. This of course then leads to difficulty with speech discrimination and speech understanding.

With ChannelFree™, we aim to capture and amplify every single one of those phonemes in order to benefit the patient with better speech understanding.

SMAKA: Some people might think of ChannelFree™ as being a single channel, like in the old days of one-channel hearing aids. How is it different from that?

ZIRKE: That is a great question. ChannelFree™ amplification is very different from the outdated single-channel wideband compression that produces frequency responses that have the same shape, regardless of input level. Two-channel compression systems overcame some of the inflexibility of single-channel wideband compression, by introducing different compression ratios in the lower and higher frequencies. Later, multichannel systems further increased flexibility.

ChannelFree™ goes even further: a controllable filter directly implements continuous frequency responses that match fitting targets within 1 dB, providing a continuously variable compression ratio across frequency.



ChannelFree™ provides independent adjustment of compression across frequencies.

So basically with a one-channel system you're going to apply one level of gain to your frequency curve, depending on the input. With ChannelFree™ we're going to be applying gain to every phoneme, taking approximately 20,000 samples per second. It's almost as if you had limitless channels, in a way.

SMAKA: So you can think of it like 'phoneme compression.'

ZIRKE: Exactly.

SMAKA: Let's talk more about Vérité and the other products that offer ChannelFree.



Vérité features ChannelFree™ processing, binaural coordination and synchronization, data logging, data streaming, and more

ZIRKE: The Vérité is our premium receiver-in-the-ear product. And then, in the very near future, we will be announcing the launch of a full product family with ChannelFree signal processing known as Veras.

SMAKA: What other features are available in these hearing aids?

ZIRKE: In addition to ChannelFree these products have many other advanced adaptive features. They will offer an automatic adaptive program that's switches seamlessly between environments, as well as binaural coordination and synchronization, data logging and data streaming.

Vérité also has a feature called Dynamic Contrast, which is designed to help people to understand speech in loud noise better.

SMAKA: Can you explain more about what that is?

ZIRKE: We know that understanding speech in noise is still a problem for many people with hearing loss, even with advanced technology hearing aids. With the Dynamic Contrast Mode, the compression is going to change in order to maximize the speech envelope information available to the listener in a noisy environment, to help speech understanding. In the new Veras line, the higher end products will have Dynamic Contrast incorporated into another feature known as the Environment Optimizer.

SMAKA: I see there's also a remote control option and Bluetooth® compatibility. Tell me about that.



SoundGate provides a wireless connection to other audio devices

ZIRKE: I'd be happy to. Bluetooth use with hearing instruments is a hot topic. There are some great accessories for connectivity that are available with the Vérité. We have SoundGate, a wireless communication link that provides a connection between the hearing aids and other audio sources such as cell phones or GPS devices equipped with Bluetooth transmitters. SoundGate is a very small device, only about 4" by 1" across, so it's nice and compact.

Another great accessory is our TV adapter, which allows you to have wireless communication between your television and your Vérité instruments so that you can listen to television directly through your hearing aids. This has been a huge hit since its release.

SMAKA: I'm looking at the picture of SoundGate on your website. I didn't know that the SoundGate was so small. So it's basically the size of, like, an iPod Nano.

ZIRKE: Similar. It's just a touch thicker than an iPod Nano. It's a very compact little piece of equipment.

SMAKA: So it's considerably smaller than my clunky iPhone.

ZIRKE: Yes. SoundGate is also a lot lighter. I have an iPhone too and compared to the SoundGate it's considerably heavier. SoundGate is very lightweight and very small.

SMAKA: Tammy, what you can you tell me about the design of Vérité?



Bernafon's Vérité is available in a wide array of colors, that can be changed in-office. Tammy recommends Cranberry Red for Ohio State fans.

ZIRKE: We love the design. Vérité features an award-winning style and design that we are very proud of. It has a small, rounded, organic form and is available in a great palette of colors. And, professionals can change the color of the Vérité very, very easily in-office in less than one minute. This is a great benefit for patients who want to change the color from time to time.

I spoke with a customer a few weeks ago at a conference who came up with a brilliant fitting idea. She was telling me that for some patients, it's difficult to tell right from left with receiver-in-canal instruments. So this professional fits Vérité with red and blue casings only on the inside panel, and she leaves the outside panel to match the customer's skin or hair tone. That way, the patient can tell right device from left device, but since the red and blue are just on the inside panel that's worn against the head, nobody else can see it. It's a great tip to make wearing Vérité even easier for your patient.

SMAKA: Tammy, what Vérité color would you select for yourself?

ZIRKE: Oh, that's a good question. I would probably have to go with Cranberry Red, simply because it's football season and I live in Columbus, Ohio home of The Ohio State University.

SMAKA: And you could always switch it out after football season.

ZIRKE: Exactly. After that I would go back to Birch Beige, which is still our number one seller.

SMAKA: What is the fitting range of Vérité?

ZIRKE: We offer two receivers, so it's a very flexible fitting range. The matrix for our power receiver is 59 dB/120 dB. The regular receiver is called an M receiver, it's a 47/109 dB matrix.

SMAKA: I assume that the power receiver is paired with more of a closed dome?

ZIRKE: We offer three different sizes of power domes in addition to three different sizes of open domes, as well as tulip domes. And then of course you can always have custom molds made as well.

SMAKA: Tammy, you mentioned working in audiology and technical support. What are the top questions you get from customers about ChannelFree™ or about Bernafon?

ZIRKE: Vérité has generated a lot of excitement, and we get questions about its features, and its fitting range - the usual product questions.

A lot of people are very curious about ChannelFree in general. Because we are the only manufacturer that can offer this technology we get tons of phone calls with questions about how it works and how it benefits the patients.

SMAKA: One thing that really surprised me in this conversation was all the technology that Bernafon has to offer, such as wireless technology and binaural coordination in Vérité.

ZIRKE: We like to think of ourselves as the best kept secret in the industry. (laughs) We also hear that from customers, and they want to know more about Bernafon as a company. So to tell you a little bit about Bernafon itself, we are headquartered in the Bern region of Switzerland, hence the name Bernafon. We've been in business for just over 60 years and as I mentioned we're the only company to develop ChannelFree™ digital signal processing. Bernafon is a small company;we chose not to be everything to everybody, but we like to consider ourselves very progressive and also very customer-focused.

We're also really pleased to have been chosen as a select supplier for the United States Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) digital hearing aid contract that went into effect on November 1st.

SMAKA: Excellent. Tammy, do you foresee ChannelFree™ being available in other products in the future?

ZIRKE: Definitely. As I mentioned earlier, in the coming weeks we'll be introducing a new line of ChannelFree™ hearing aids to accompany the Vérité and round out the product family. It will be a full family with a new design called the Veras and we're really excited for it to hit the market.

ChannelFree has been a huge success for Bernafon and I'm sure it will be incorporated into other product lines in the future as well.

SMAKA: Thanks, we'll be checking www.bernafon-us.com for more information. Tammy, where do the product names come from - like Vérité?

ZIRKE: Vérité is a powerful word - it means truth.

SMAKA: I didn't know that, but it's a nice sounding word in English, too.

ZIRKE: Yes, I think so, too.

SMAKA: Tammy, it's been nice catching up with you, and please keep us posted on Veras.

ZIRKE: I sure will. Thanks for having me, Carolyn.

More information on ChannelFree™ amplification, Vérité, and other Bernafon products and technology, can be found at www.bernafon-us.com