We’ve been helping deaf people and people with hearing loss for more than 100 years, and changed the lives of millions since we started.
Our landmark achievements include successfully lobbying the NHS to provide free hearing aids in 1948, and ensuring all newborn babies receive hearing screening from 2000.
We’ve also been involved in life-changing research and, today, hundreds of thousands of people have checked their hearing with our online hearing check.
The beginning
In the early 1900s, Leo Bonn, a successful banker with hearing loss, decided to use his wealth to improve the lives of those who were deaf, or had hearing loss.
There were many societies, schools and missions devoted to the education and welfare of deaf people but they didn’t work together. Leo saw the need for a new, national organisation to coordinate activities so more people could be helped.
His aims were ambitious:
- to support and care for deaf people and people with hearing loss
- to educate people at risk of damaging their hearing
- and to raise awareness of how isolating hearing loss and deafness can be.
A national charity for deaf people
In 1910, Leo was introduced to Arthur Story, headmaster of the Mount Blind and Deaf School in Stoke-on-Trent, who was leading the call for a national organisation for deaf people.
Leo was so impressed that on 9 June 1911, he hosted a meeting of the disparate organisations at his Mayfair home, where he offered to establish and fund the National Bureau for promoting the General Welfare of the Deaf.
Continuing to improve lives
With Leo at the helm, the founding organisations set out their three aims: to coordinate charity activities for deaf people, provide accurate information and statistics, and suggest reforms to improve their lives.
Since then, we’ve achieved so much. But our work’s not over yet. You can view our timeline below to see how our work has continued to evolve.
With your support, we can continue the work that our founder Leo Bonn began, and change the lives of even more people who are deaf, have hearing loss or tinnitus.
Our timeline
We’ve helped millions of people in the century since our charity began. Our key events show how we’ve been changing lives from our start in 1911 right up to today.
The beginning years: 1910 – 1950
On 9 June, Leo Bonn, founds The National Bureau for Promoting the General Welfare of the Deaf.
We reorganise the charity to raise our post-war profile and rename it The National Institute for the Deaf.
We open our first residential care home in Lancashire, going on to become one of the UK’s leading specialist-care providers
We successfully lobby the newly formed NHS to provide free hearing aids and batteries UK-wide.
Helping the development of hearing aids: 1950-1990
We launch our first helpline, the Personal Advice Bureau, to answer the increasing number of queries we receive.
The Queen approves the addition of ‘Royal’ to our name for our jubilee year. We become the Royal National Institute for the Deaf.
We launch a hearing aid battery tester to help hearing aid users check their batteries easily and quickly.
Following our research, the NHS issues behind-the-ear hearing aids.
We successfully campaign for rubella vaccinations for young women. The virus, which can cause deafness and other disabilities in unborn babies, has since been virtually wiped out in the UK.
Michael Batt becomes the first British child to receive a cochlear implant, following almost a decade of research and work with surgeons at the Royal Ear Hospital.
Breakthroughs in research and digital inclusion: 1990-2020
Following our campaign with the National Deaf Children’s Society, all newborn babies are offered hearing screening by the NHS.
We also start working with the NHS to deliver modern digital hearing aids as standard.
Research we fund links a type of gene, called a microRNA, to hearing loss for the first time. This work opens up a new field of research into hearing loss.
We celebrate our 100th birthday and change our name to Action on Hearing Loss.
We also launch our Translational Research Initiative for Hearing (TRIH), which encourages pharmaceutical companies to invest in the development of new treatments and cures for hearing loss and tinnitus.
Research funded by us shows human stem cells restore hearing in deafened gerbils – a breakthrough in the search for a way to restore natural hearing.
We merge with medical charity, Deafness Research UK. Together, and with more funding, we’re determined to cure hearing loss within a generation.
A new genetic test for hearing loss becomes available on the NHS as a result of RNID funded research. The test screens for most of the known genes that cause deafness.
A research breakthrough identified the first gene, SERPINF1, to cause otosclerosis, a condition leading to deafness.
Our campaigners change the law by securing an amendment to the Digital Economy Act 2017. This gave the government power to regulate online video services and require them to have a minimum level of subtitled and signed content.
Thanks to our calls, NICE publishes the first guideline for the assessment and management of hearing loss. This recognises the enormous benefit hearing aids provide and states that hearing aids should be given to all who need them.
Shaping an inclusive future: 2020 – Present
We change our name back to RNID and launch our new purpose: “Together, we will make life fully inclusive for deaf people and those with hearing loss or tinnitus.”
We launch a free online hearing check. It takes 3 minutes and will suggest whether your hearing is in a normal range or whether you may have hearing loss.
RNID joins the multi-organisational BSL Act Now! campaign, led by the British Deaf Association, to demand legal recognition to British Sign Language (BSL). The campaign is a success with the passing of the BSL Act.
Joining forces with RNIB, and our ambassador Sam Baines, we continue our Subtitle It! campaign, demanding for better provision of subtitles and interpretation on on-demand TV.
This triggers the drafting of the Government’s Media Bill, which passed its second reading at the end of 2023.
This year starts with the launch of our Ear Wax Removal campaign, highlighting the lack of NHS provision of free ear wax removal services for those with a medical need. The campaign and our new report takes the media by storm, as RNID is featured in the press and on national TV.