The Disability Discrimination Act and Hearing Disability

From the 1st October 2004 the Disability Discrimination Act 1995 (DDA) made it unlawful to discriminate against disabled people; this includes not making reasonable alternations to public service premises, for example leisure centres, to ease access.

According to the DDA anyone who wears a hearing aid has a disability, thus failing to make provision for them is against the law. Deaf Aid loops are considered an auxiliary aid to assist people with hearing disabilities and they are a cost effective way to fulfil your legal obligation under the act; more importantly they improve communication with the hearing impaired and provide a better customer service.

Where a person with normal hearing can have a reasonable level of intelligibility in the presence of very loud background noise, a person with hearing loss needs a much greater distinction between the sound they wish to hear and the interfering background noise. The installation of a Deaf Aid Loop makes it is possible to offer people a much clearer and defined sound quality.

A Deaf Aid Loop System uses a special amplifier called an Induction Loop Driver which creates a magnetic field at audio frequencies and is picked up by the hearing aid, when switched to the “T-coil mode”. These systems when correctly set up can result in immense improvements in sound intelligibility. All Audio Induction Loop Drivers must be CE approved to meet Interference Regulations (EMC). These standards impose strict controls on the performance of the equipment in the field of immunity, spurious emissions and electrical safety; the UK standard is known as BS EN60118-4.

Systems can be designed to cover just the reception areas or the whole pool building if required, and can be linked in to existing audio systems.

Please contact us if you would like further information on Deaf Aid Loops or require a technical survey.