Assistive visual aid for the elderly hearing impaired

With the aging global population, according to WHO, 1-in-3 individuals over the age of 65 years (a total of 65 million people worldwide) suffer from hearing loss. This paper tap on the ubiquitous mobile device and proposes the development of a mobile phone based assistive visual aid for the elderly hearing impaired to assist them in their daily life when they choose not to or cannot afford to wear hearing aids. In fact, the proposed assistive visual hearing aid can be used by the hearing impaired community at large and not just confined to the elderly. The visual “hearing” aid takes the form of a noninvasive, inexpensive, in-conspicuous and easy-to-use app on a mobile phone or tablet in which the elderly can record the speech. It will automatically perform a speech-to-text conversion locally on the mobile phone in real time such that the elderly can read the text visually. Non-real time conversion is also made available where the conversion is done at the backend server via Internet. This app is intended to enable the hearing impaired community and the elderly to lead a fulfilling and independent lifestyle despite the challenges caused by their impairments.