CLINICAL | NIRGenie

Delivering confidence every step of the way

The problem

Annually, more than two out of every thousand newborns experience hearing loss. Without prompt diagnosis and intervention—through hearing aids or cochlear implants—these children risk never learning to speak.

Each week's delay in treatment can irreversibly affect their language skills, subsequently impacting their educational, professional, and social futures.

Their devices need to be accurately programmed if they are to gain real benefit from them, and this can take many months to achieve.

Infants with auditory neuropathy, a special form of hearing loss, miss out on early intervention all together because the standard technology cannot be relied upon. For them it may take many months or even years until they can receive the right therapy.

Many more children experience delays in language development, despite apparently normal hearing, and risk the same impact on their lives.

Our solution

Enter EarGenie®, our innovative, user-friendly system, designed by audiologists for clinical use. It is designed to automatically assess hearing by using light to measure brain responses to speech sounds—even during sleep.

This technology is designed to swiftly and automatically determine what sounds a baby or child can hear and, for the first time, measure whether they can distinguish between different speech sounds. With this new information we intend to give clinicians and parents solid and objective evidence to support decision making.

Are hearing aids needed?
Would cochlear implants be better?
How can we program cochlear implants accurately for young infants?
Are the hearing devices precisely adjusted to maximize language development?

Once approved, EarGenie® is poised to revolutionize early hearing and language intervention, deliver operational efficiencies and new additional customers, tests and revenue to clinics.

Our research confirms that fNIRS technology combined with our test and analysis methods can provide accurate, valuable information for both clinicians and families. Our first-in-human clinical trial has demonstrated the safety and tolerability of our prototype device which will shortly undergo a further trial to assess performance.