EUHA Congress 2024: A big stage for hearing acoustics - 68th international branch meeting in Hanover

The world’s largest industry event impressed with more than 130 exhibitors, 26 expert presentations, five tutorials, a special Future Friday programme, free admission for trainees and students and the new EUHA Live Area.

Beate Gromke, President of the European Union of Hearing Aid Acousticians (EUHA), and Gregor Dittrich, Member of the Board of the German Association of the Hearing Aid Industry (BVHI), spoke at the opening of the congress.

The visit by Dr Andreas Philippi was a special honour. In his welcome address, the Lower Saxony Minister for Social Affairs, Labour, Health and Equality emphasised: ‘Successful communication, social participation and fair educational opportunities are only possible if hearing impairments are corrected.’ Peder Søgaard-Pedersen, Director of Denmark’s largest employers’ organisation, Dansk Industri, gave a welcome address on behalf of the partner country Denmark.

Right on trend: EUHA Live Area

The welcome reception took place in the new EUHA Live Area, which was a central meeting and networking point for personal dialogue on all three days. The stage programme in the EUHA Live Area presented complementary topics to the congress programme, which were well received.

Industry exhibition

Over 130 exhibitors from 19 countries presented numerous innovations in Hall 6. The top four exhibiting countries were Germany, China, Denmark and France. 58 per cent of the exhibitors came from Germany, 42 per cent from abroad. 230 trainees and students visited this year’s event in Hanover, gathered information and took part in a total of two guided tours.

Knowledge symposium

The EUHA Knowledge Symposium kicked off the scientific lecture programme, which was supported by 38 national and international speakers. Professor Torsten Dau from the Technical University of Denmark opened the event with a presentation entitled ‘New trends in technical compensation strategies for hearing aids’.

Afterwards, EUHA Vice President Eva Keil-Becker awarded the EUHA sponsorship prizes to Maren Harries M. Sc. who received first prize for her topic ‘Evaluation of a new speech material for the Freiburg one-syllable test based on word frequency distribution’. Dr Martin Orf was awarded second prize; his topic was: ‘Selective attention in multi-talker situations: Neural and behavioural mechanisms’. Alina-Sophie Bockelmann B. Sc. was awarded third prize for her topic ‘Evaluation of simulated free-field presentation for listening experiments’.

The FDHA Foundation Prize was awarded by Prof Dr med Karin Schorn to Prof Dr Annette Limberger from Aalen University. She received the award in recognition of her valuable interdisciplinary collaboration between ENT medicine, phoniatrics and paediatric audiology, paediatrics and hearing acoustics.

Future Friday

On Friday, Theresa Schleicher spoke about the future of retail and the changing interests of consumers. PD Dr Benedikt Höing explained the use of AI in CI care. Sergi Rotger-Griful from the Eriksholm Research Centre in Denmark shed light on communication challenges for people with hearing loss. Finally, Prof Dr David Matusiewicz, an expert in digital health, provided insights into the digital transformation in the healthcare sector.

Conclusion

The EUHA Congress 2024 was a win-win situation for all participants. Innovative products, up-to-date knowledge and personal dialogue made the congress a very special experience. The next EUHA Congress will take place in Nuremberg from 22 to 24 October 2025.