Wayne Staab

Dr. Staab is an internationally recognized authority in hearing aids. As President of Dr. Wayne J. Staab and Associates, he is engaged in consulting, research, development, manufacturing, education, and marketing projects related to hearing. His professional career has included University teaching, hearing clinic work, hearing aid company management and sales, and extensive work with engineering in developing and bringing new technology and products to the discipline of hearing. This varied background allows him to couple manufacturing and business with the science of acoustics to bring innovative developments and insights to our discipline. Dr. Staab has authored numerous books, chapters, and articles related to hearing aids and their fitting, and is an internationally-requested presenter. He is a past President and past Executive Director of the American Auditory Society and a retired Fellow of the International Collegium of Rehabilitative Audiology. Interests engaged in outside of the above include: fishing, hunting, hiking, mountain biking, golf, travel, tennis, softball, lecturing, sporting clays, 4-wheeling, archery, swimming, guitar, computers, and photography. These are great topics of discussion away from business.

Self-Fitting of Hearing Devices – Part I

Self-Fitting of Hearing Devices – Part I Self-fitting of hearing devices is an inherent feature of OTC or DTC (over-the-counter; direct-to-consumer) hearing aids. What can we expect now that this is becoming an active feature of hearing aid sales? The real issue, as expressed by Bess1, is not how an OTC or DTC hearing aid delivery system benefits hearing

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Movies Too Loud? Still?

Movies too loud? Do the high loudness levels of many movies help to tell the story, or are the high loudness levels provided to cover a weak story? – Snarky question by this article’s author High Volume Story to Tell, or Weak Story to Hide?* Movie viewing has been enjoyed for decades. During this time, there have been significant

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3D Printing: Additive Manufacturing Part 3

Two previous posts discussed 3D printing. This technology is currently being used in the hearing aid industry, as it is in many other industries, for modeling, and even for some product fabricating, especially earmolds and custom-molded shells for in-ear products. A previous post described Stereolithography (SL) and Selective Laser Sintering (SLS). This post describes two additional 3D printing processes likely

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3D Printing – Part 2

A previous post opened a conversation about 3D printing. This technology is currently being used in the hearing aid industry, as it is in many other industries, for modeling, and even for some product fabricating, especially earmolds and custom-molded shells for in-ear products. Four different types of 3D printing processes likely to be encountered, are: Stereolithography (SLA) Selective Laser Sintering

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3D Printing

Much has been written about 3D printing. For those who fit hearing aids, especially custom-molded types, or earmolds, many of us have been told that the shells have been 3D printed. But, what does this actually mean? What is 3D Printing? This is known also as desktop fabrication, or additive manufacturing. It is unique in that actual objects are

Featured image for “Batteries for Early Transistor Hearing Aids”

Batteries for Early Transistor Hearing Aids

The transition from vacuum tube to transistor hearing aids occurred in the mid 1950s. The transistor allowed for a single power supply, and voltage as low as 1.4. Being able to operate on 1.4 volts reduced tremendously the power requirements, both in size and required voltage from that required for vacuum tube hearing aids. Essentially all hearing aids made this

Featured image for “Vintage Hearing Aid Batteries – Shown in Use”

Vintage Hearing Aid Batteries – Shown in Use

Previous posts have talked about early vacuum tube and transistor hearing aids, and the hearing aid batteries they used. A tremendous change occurred in hearing aid size in going from vacuum tubes to transistors as amplifiers. Much of that related to changes in the battery size as well, as previously discussed. This post is intended to show how some of

Featured image for “Vintage Hearing Aid Batteries”

Vintage Hearing Aid Batteries

In researching vintage hearing aid batteries, occasional references are made to the power supplies (batteries) used. However, for most individuals, never having been exposed to out-of-date hearing aids, there is little reason to expect to know what some of the sizes and types were. This post will review some of the commonly-used batteries and cells at the time, but which

Featured image for “The First CROS Hearing Aids?”

The First CROS Hearing Aids?

In 1965, Harford and Barry were credited for the first accessible published description of across-head fitting1. It was called the CROS (Contralateral Routing of Offside Signals). Harford and Barry did acknowledge, however, that Wullstein and Wigand had published results on an almost identical across-head arrangement three years earlier2. The Wullstein and Wigand work has seldom been quoted in related literature

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Auriculostomy Hearing Aid – Surgical Procedure

This post is a continuation of an attempt to archive some historical events related to hearing aids – that of the auriculostomy. As reported in a previous post, the auriculostomy may have been the first surgical involvement in the fitting of an electrical hearing aid. It provided an alternate approach to the application of corrective amplification involving ear-level hearing aids