There are only so many honest-to-goodness trailblazers in the world, and Dr. Ingeborg Hochmair is one of them. The Founder and Chief Executive Officer of Med-El, Dr. Hochmair is the godmother of the cochlear implant, having worked along her husband Erwin to create the world's first microelectronic multi-channel cochlear implant, which was first used in 1977. By the time she started Med-El in 1989, she was already a living legend in the medical community, and that was a whopping 36 years ago.
Put simply, there are few people on this planet who have done so much for so many people as Dr. Hochmair, who has never wavered from her commitment to help fight hearing loss. She has more than 40 patents to her name, all related to cochlear implants, and continues to help the medical community innovate to this day.
But Dr. Hochmair’s job isn’t simply as a scientist. It’s as an educator. As she said in a 2021 interview, while most deaf children are given a cochlear implant at birth, older patients often don’t know they’re available, or that they should be using one. While she thinks, about widespread adoption among older adults, that “by having cochlear devices perform better and better, it automatically happens,” she laments that “so many people who should wear a hearing aid… don’t wear a hearing aid for whatever reason, who we should inform and who we are trying to inform about the existence of this technology.”
As technology advances faster than ever, Med-El is adapting right alongside it, and Dr. Hochmair isn’t slowing down. Instead, she’s exhorting younger medical professionals to join the fight against hearing loss, urging them to “engage with cutting-edge technology that has a tangible impact on people's lives, making their work both inspiring and fulfilling.”
A singular figure in the health tech community, Dr. Hochmair has done so much good, for so many people, and through her work, is hoping to reach many more.
