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Inventor of the hearScreen technology and Co-Founder of the HearX group, Professor De Wet Swanepoel, has developed technology to make hearing tests accessible to all – a project that he is hoping to take to the next level with the help of the Chivas Venture Competition.
HearScreen is one of five finalists in the 2018 Chivas Venture Competition. They are each competing to win a share of $1 million, and the chance of a lifetime to represent South Africa in Chivas Regal’s Venture 4 finals to be held in 2018.
“I realised that many people are unaware of the severity of their hearing loss, and that very few were being tested,” he says. “So I wanted to develop a system that could be used, with minimal training, by people in the community to detect early signs of hearing loss. With smartphones becoming cheaper and more widespread, it made sense to use technology.”
The hearScreen technology is a world-first smartphone-based hearing test solution that has the potential to reach communities that don’t traditionally have access to cost-effective hearing tests.
Prof Swanepoel says deafness and hearing loss is an “invisible epidemic which affects more than 5% of the world’s population, mainly in lower income and rural areas. These people don’t have access to hearing loss technology”.
During the testing, the microphone on the mobile device is used to monitor environmental noise, detecting whether test conditions are too loud. The test information received from the smartphone is automatically uploaded to a cloud service, and can then be accessed manually, at a later stage, for further research.
HearScreen technology is user-friendly, so much so that anyone can operate it. Professor Swanepoel says that in order for it to be successful it has to flow easily and be intuitive.
“My dream is to be in a world where everyone has access to healthy hearing and winning the Chivas Venture award would be a huge step towards this vision.”
