Assistive Listening Knowledge Base
  • Manufacturer patent (granted US patent)

Ear-worn electronic device configured to compensate for hunched or stooped posture (US 11,778,392 B2)

From https://assistivelisteningknowledgebase.org/evidence/starkey-2023-posture-patent/ · record checked 9 October 2026

  • Burwinkel JR, Seitz-Paquette K
  • United States Patent and Trademark Office

Manufacturer (Starkey Laboratories, a hearing aid maker, is the assignee)

Summary

A hearing aid maker's patent on adjusting hearing aids for wearers with a stooped posture, whose background states how much a tilted telecoil loses from a loop's field.

Key findings

  • States that a telecoil's sensitivity to a magnetic field from the horizontal plane depends on its orientation: 45 degrees from its best position gives about 3 dB less input, 60 degrees about 6 dB less, and 90 degrees zero or near-zero input.
  • Notes that telecoils are often mounted at an angle of 15 to 45 degrees inside the hearing aid, so in an extreme case a wearer with a stooped posture (kyphosis) who tilts the head 30 degrees could have the telecoil 75 degrees from its best position.
  • Says hearing aid microphones and telecoils are oriented by design for typical posture, and that poor fittings can leave a hearing aid resting on the ear at a suboptimal angle.

Limits

Background text in a patent, not a study: the angle figures follow from geometry and are not tied to measurements or to listeners, and the patent gives no data on how many users tilt their heads or stoop. The applicant has a commercial interest in the remedy it claims. Filed on 27 October 2020 (priority 14 November 2019) and granted on 3 October 2023; the patent text was read through Google Patents and the link given is the USPTO's copy.

Read the original

image-ppubs.uspto.gov/dirsearch-public/print/downloadPdf/11778392

Link checked . We link to the original and do not host copies.

Cited in

Cite this source

Burwinkel JR, Seitz-Paquette K. Ear-worn electronic device configured to compensate for hunched or stooped posture (US 11,778,392 B2). United States Patent and Trademark Office. 3 October 2023. https://image-ppubs.uspto.gov/dirsearch-public/print/downloadPdf/11778392 (accessed 9 October 2026).

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