Hearing protection
AssigneeMinuendo AS
InventorsOlav Kvaløy, Tom Trones
Life of this patent
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Abstract
A hearing protection system comprises a hearing protection device adapted for placement over or insertion into a user's ear. The hearing protection device comprises a first microphone arranged to determine an internal sound level characteristic within the user's ear canal. The hearing protection system further comprises a second microphone arranged to determine an ambient sound level characteristic. The system is arranged to compare the internal and ambient sound level characteristics to determine a difference metric therebetween and to generate an indication if the difference metric is greater than a difference threshold and the internal sound level characteristic is lower than an internal sound threshold.
Claims16
A hearing protection system comprising:
- a first hearing protection device adapted for placement over or insertion into a user's ear canal, said hearing protection device comprising a first microphone arranged to determine an internal sound level characteristic within the user's ear canal,
- a second hearing protection device adapted for placement over the first hearing protection device;
- and
- a second microphone arranged to determine an ambient sound level characteristic, the system being arranged to:
- compare said internal and ambient sound level characteristics to determine a difference metric therebetween;
- determine that the second hearing protection device is placed over the first hearing protection device if said difference metric is greater than a difference threshold;
- and
- generate an indication that the user's hearing is overprotected if the second hearing protection device is placed over the first hearing protection device and said internal sound level characteristic is lower than an internal sound threshold.
A method of determining whether a user's hearing is overprotected, comprising:
- determining an internal sound level characteristic within an ear canal of the user;
- determining an ambient sound level characteristic;
- comparing the internal and ambient sound level characteristics to determine a difference metric therebetween;
- comparing the difference metric with a difference threshold;
- determining that a second hearing protection device is placed over a first hearing protection device adapted for placement over or insertion into the ear canal of the user if said difference metric is greater than the difference threshold;
- comparing the internal sound level characteristic with an internal sound threshold;
- and
- generating an indication that the user's hearing is overprotected if the second hearing protection device is placed over the first hearing protection device and said internal sound level characteristic is lower than the internal sound threshold.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.