With the new Alpha XT, Bernafon further strengthens the family of hearing aids built on Hybrid Technology™. Featuring groundbreaking wind and contact noise protectors, plus improved transient noise reduction, the new Alpha XT helps users to better engage in conversation in more listening situations – without the distractions that can lead to frustrations and reduced wearing times. The launch also includes other new features and a convenient new all-in-one app for both hearing aid control and remote support.

Bernafon is pleased to announce the next generation of Alpha hearing aids featuring the excellent audiological performance of Bernafon Hybrid Technology™. The new range of Alpha XT hearing aids continues to strengthen Bernafon’s Hybrid Technology with the addition of Hybrid Sound Care™, a feature that solves a well-known problem in the industry – that of noise created at the hearing aid microphones through wind or direct contact. The introduction of a brand-new complementary app improves the user experience even further.

Hybrid Sound Care™: Made to tackle noise and improve comfort
Wearing hearing aids outdoors in windy conditions is a very real challenge for hearing aid users, as is the everyday direct contact of hearing aids with hair, face masks, and glasses. Wind and contact noise picked up by a hearing aid's microphones can get amplified, causing annoyance and discomfort for the user. It can also result in the masking of other sounds and reduced speech understanding. The Bernafon Alpha XT hearing aid addresses these challenges using the wind and contact noise protector in Hybrid Sound Care. By rapidly putting more emphasis on the least affected microphones in noisy environments, this new feature effectively reduces noise at the start of the signal processing, while also increasing speech clarity. Alpha XT also further improves transient noise reduction settings, aimed at improving comfort around everyday sudden noises such as rattling cutlery and keyboard clicks.

“We’re proud of this breakthrough that solves a real challenge for hearing aid users,” explains Tine Schou, Vice President, Brand Management, remarking on the impact of the new Hybrid Sound Care technology. “It’s an exciting milestone that expands on the excellent sound quality and reliability hearing care professionals have come to expect from Bernafon. But it’s also much more than that,” she adds. “By removing the frustrations of wind and contact noise, we’re taking a powerful step forward in solving the core industry challenge of hearing aid acceptance and usage. Anything we can do to help more people with hearing loss experience the quality-of-life benefits of wearing a hearing aid is a win for hearing healthcare.”

New Bernafon App: Simplified all-in-one control and support
In addition to its audiological innovations, Alpha XT introduces new features and a new app to further improve the user experience. The new Bernafon App combines intuitive hearing aid control and remote support into one user-friendly app. Combined with the extensive connectivity offering of Bernafon Alpha XT, users can benefit from easy direct sound streaming, hearing aid control, and remote support from their hearing care professional at their fingertips.

Other upgrades include a new ‘spoken notification’ feature, which replaces beeps so that users can be confident in understanding the notifications delivered by their hearing aids.  Also, with Alpha XT, Bernafon introduces conversation tracking. This enhanced data logging feature determines when a user is engaged in conversation, as well as their surrounding environment’s complexity level. The data is then available to hearing care professionals via the Oasis fitting programme, enabling them to provide more personalised counselling.

Bernafon Alpha XT is available in four styles, including Bernafon’s popular miniRITE T R and miniBTE T R hearing aid styles, all of which come with the latest connectivity to complement a modern lifestyle, including convenient hands-free communication.