How Bluetooth® Technology Is Enabling a More Accessible World

Around the world, billions of people are affected by a range of visual, mobility, speech, and hearing challenges that have the potential to significantly impact their quality of life. According to the World Health Organization (WHO), more than 2.5 billion people need one or more assistive products that can maintain or improve an individual’s functioning and independence. By 2050, this is anticipated to increase to 3.5 billion. With this in mind, making the world more accessible through the availability of new assistive technologies and products will be fundamental to future global prosperity at both the individual and societal levels. In addition to the growing rollout of Low Energy (LE) Audio and Auracast™ Broadcast Audio solutions and deployments for assistive listening purposes, wireless technologies like Bluetooth® are enabling a range of assistive products that can aid those faced with visual, mobility, speech, and other accessibility challenges.

According to the WHO, at least 2.2 billion people have some form of visual impairment. For many years, Bluetooth® technology has supported those impacted through the availability of a wide range of visual accessibility assistive products, such as reading-assistance devices, large-print accessibility keyboards, and text-to-voice products. Meanwhile, new product categories, such as smart glasses, have the potential to bring benefits to users faced with different types of accessibility challenges. For example, Bluetooth®-enabled smart glasses, such as the ViXion01 and ViXion01S, feature innovative autofocus technology, automatically adjusting the focus to improve near and far vision for users, improving sight and reducing eye strain and fatigue when engaging in activities that require different types of focus. Meanwhile, several smart glasses have emerged that enable real-time captioning of conversations. These leverage built-in microphones to listen to the user’s conversation, transcribe it on a smartphone via Bluetooth® technology, and then present it on the smart glasses display.

Bluetooth® technology is also transforming how people faced with mobility challenges can interact with the world around them, enabling individuals to move more freely, participate in a range of work and leisure activities, communicate more effectively with family and friends, and live more independently. For example, many wheelchairs and wheelchair control systems are equipped with Bluetooth® technology, enabling users to leverage a joystick or alternative control system to operate personal mobile and computing devices. Innovative smart-mouthwear solutions can allow users to control their smart devices by converting subtle tongue and head gestures into cursor control and clicks. Bluetooth®-enabled medical-grade wireless sensors can leverage Electromyography (EMG) to interpret signals sent from the brain to the muscle to translate this into a control input. Meanwhile, a range of assistive switches, games controllers, wearables, and other input devices are all enabling those with limited dexterity or mobility challenges to achieve greater independence, participation, and inclusion. There are also a range of Bluetooth® mobility aids, including prosthetics, bionics, and exoskeletons, that use the technology to connect with companion apps, enable firmware updates, support remote configuration and control, and be used for diagnostics purposes.

Bluetooth® technology is leveraged in a range of speech-generating devices built for people with conditions such as Motor Neurone Disease (MND), aphasia, cerebral palsy, Rett syndrome, or spinal cord injuries. With approximately 10% of the U.S. adult population having a speech, language, and/or voice impairment, these devices can enable users to send messages and emails or call someone using a synthetic voice, enabling them to communicate regardless of their individual challenges.

There are many characteristics of Bluetooth® technology that make it a key enabler of assistive products. As many assistive products such as hearing aids, wearables, skin-worn sensors, smart glasses, and smart mouthwear come in extremely small form factors with limited battery sizes, the ultra-low power benefits of Bluetooth® technology make it uniquely positioned to enable hours, days, or months of operation. Bluetooth® technology’s ubiquitous presence in mobile and computing devices means it is uniquely positioned to enable these solutions via companion updates, firmware updates, remote control and configuration, while the wide availability of Bluetooth® audio solutions enable users to receive discreet voice readouts, text-to-speech, and in-ear guidance directly to their headphones or hearing aids.

Bluetooth® technology also continues to evolve and add new features and capabilities, many of which will benefit the future development of assistive products. For example, work is ongoing to bring several further enhancements to Auracast™ broadcast audio, such as defining a standardized approach when using multiple Auracast™ transmitters in larger environments, support for more streams to support multi-language broadcasts, and a standardized approach to discovering Auracast™ broadcasts on constrained receiver devices, such as hearing aids, without the need for a smartphone. Similarly, reductions in latency through the Ultra-Low Latency (ULL) Human-Interface Device (HID) enhancement project aims to make Bluetooth® controllers as responsive as those using Universal Serial Bus (USB)-wired or proprietary wireless communications. This could prove beneficial to many assistive HID and control devices. Meanwhile, the competitive and ever-growing ecosystem of Bluetooth® Integrated Circuit (IC) vendors and other solution providers continue to drive improvements on other key metrics, such as power consumption, robustness, size, and range, providing enhanced flexibility and convenience for users of assistive products.

For an extended discussion on this topic, ABI Research has recently published a whitepaper highlighting the key use cases, products, and benefits of utilizing Bluetooth® technology in assistive products.