The Sohum device

The Sohum hearing screening device is a highly proprietary, non-invasive, safe device to screen neonates for hearing impairment with high sensitivity and specificity and is specially designed for mass screening of neonates in resource-constrained settings. The Sohum product and care cycle are designed so that the needs of all key stakeholders like parents, pediatricians, maternity homes, and health care workers, are met. We envision sohum as a self-sufficient and sustainable business that works toward a large scale and critical social cause. The unique business model links the child directly to Sohum certified audiologists for further care.

The technology

Sohum uses brainstem auditory evoked response (BAER or ABR) technology which is the gold standard in auditory testing and is recommended as the test of choice by the American Association of Pediatrics (US) and the National Health Services (NHS-UK). As of now, this technology is prohibitively expensive and inaccessible to the underserved populations. Sohum uses this in an innovative way with an easy-to-use interface to meet the needs of the system. In addition to this, the sensitivity and specificity is improved through our novel algorithm.