The high-pitched whirring of a dentist’s drill is one of the most anxiety-inducing sounds for many people.
About a third of the U.S. population avoid going to the dentist out of anxiety or fear, according to the National Center for Biotechnology Information.
Finally Quiet aims to end those fears.
The Aliso Viejo-based company is developing what it advertises as the first medical-grade noise cancellation system for dental use.
The company says the system will enhance patients’ treatment experience and mitigate hearing loss among dental professionals who are twice as likely as the general population to develop noise-induced hearing loss in the workplace due to prolonged exposure to loud equipment.
“The various drills and ultrasonic scalers together compose an orchestra of sounds that are creating a tremendous amount of hearing loss, so every dentist by the time they retire is partially deaf without knowing it,” Peman Montazemi told the Business Journal.
Capable of Reducing Sound by 32 Decibels
The Finally Quiet system is made up of three pieces of equipment.
It includes patient headphones with disposable covers, staff earbuds with optional custom 3D printed ear tips and a base unit that allows for cross-clinic wireless communication tailored to high-frequency noise in dental clinics.
The custom ear tips made for dentists are capable of reducing sound by 32 decibels, while the patients’ headphones have built-in sensors that pick up on the sound of drills before they hit the ear.
“That’s one of the biggest flaws of active noise-cancelling headphones that are on the market,” Montazemi said.
“They typically stop below the frequencies of dental handpieces because they generate very high frequencies, and so by the time they hit the ear of the patient, they don’t have enough time to react.”
The central unit uses artificial intelligence speech recognition. With this feature, a dentist can make commands such as playing music for the patient or connecting with the front desk.
It can also collect data via Wi-Fi from patient wait times to the utilization of a given chair, information that’s valuable to dental support organizations, Montazemi said.
Wife’s Noise-Induced Hearing Loss
About 11 years ago, Montazemi’s wife Dr. Shaghayegh Zekavati, who’s a dentist, stepped into the car one day and turned down the radio, saying she had the beginnings of tinnitus.
“She said, ‘You’re a biomedical engineer. Why don’t you do something about it,’ and that’s what triggered this idea,” Montazemi said.
Montazemi and his wife have bootstrapped the company for the past 11 years.
This year, the company is finalizing a second-generation prototype of the product with the goal of implementing it in 10 clinics.
They’ve collected 39 patient surveys reporting 82% satisfaction rate and are aiming to get that up to 95% before working on a third generation.
Montazemi said they’re meeting with the Food and Drug Administration this month to begin the regulatory process towards getting approval for Finally Quiet system as a Class II medical device and expects commercialization by the end of 2026.
