smartphone hearing screening ear probe (IMAGE)

University of Washington

smartphone hearing screening ear probe

Caption

A team led by researchers at the University of Washington has created a new hearing screening system that uses a smartphone and earbuds. One reason the commercial device is expensive is that its speaker has been designed to play the two tones without any interference. The UW researchers found that they could use affordable earbuds — where each earbud plays one of the two tones — instead. The earbuds are connected to a microphone in a probe (shown here in blue) that can be placed in the patient's ear.

Credit

Raymond Smith/University of Washington

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