Category — Hearing Loss Info

It’s fascinating to me that we all have to take a vision test to drive a car – this makes complete sense – but we don’t have to have anything else checked like our hearing.

It would really shake up our senior community if a hearing screening was mandatory before getting our drivers licenses renewed. Between you and me, looking at the people making and passing laws in our government and knowing that almost all of them are well into and past their fifties, this will never happen.  Read more... (296 words, estimated 1:11 mins reading time)

Getting the right hearing aid for your hearing loss.

To me this is one of the biggest misconceptions about hearing aids: that all hearing aids are the same.  If you go to someone who doesn’t perform some sort of real ear measurements where they actually use an independent means of verifying if your hearing aid is actually doing what it is suppose to, then you are taking a big chance.  Read more... (218 words, estimated 52 secs reading time)

How long did they put off wearing hearing aids before getting help?

This may sound strange to you.  Why would that matter?  The reason this is so important is that due to sound deprivation caused by a hearing loss, almost everyone over time losses their ability to process sounds into words.  That means if you did not use hearing aids when you first could have used them, no doubt you have this problem to some degree.

We measure how well you can understand speech with a simple phonically balanced word list.  It is measured from 100% to 0%.  About 6% of patients in my private practices have 0% of word understanding.  So even with hearing aids on but not allowing them to get other clues when someone is talking to them, like lip reading, they can hear sounds of speech but the brain just can’t make sense of it.  Read more... (275 words, estimated 1:06 mins reading time)

Many people tell everyone they know how good they can hear with their hearing aids.  They really notice and can appreciate what their hearing aid is doing for them.  Then there are those who always complain and say they are junk.  They talk to someone that loves their hearing aids and become frustrated because they aren’t doing nearly as well.  It’s very important to understand the reasons why there is such a difference.

The three most important factors that attribute to your success are:

The degree of your hearing loss.  Read more... (232 words, estimated 56 secs reading time)

My usual answer to patients is, “Only when you want to hear what’s being said.”  Hearing aids, in many ways, are like glasses. So do you wear your glasses all the time?  Most of us do.  The reason being that it is too much of a hassle not to wear them and very inconvenient when we are trying to read small print to get up and find them.  It’s important to be able to see who’s at the door or when working with small objects.

The same is true with hearing aids.  If you don’t put them on you’re going to miss what is said on TV or when someone is talking or someone knocks at your door and you can’t hear the knock.  The need for good hearing is so important especially if you live alone.  Safety is one of the biggest concerns for anyone who wants to live independently.  Read more... (259 words, estimated 1:02 mins reading time)

This is because the major component that affects word understanding for a hearing loss is the loss of high frequencies.  In the high frequency range is where the high pitched consonances are sounded out in words.  And it is the consonances that give us the meaning to most of the words in the English language.  So throw a little background noise into the mix and all that someone who has a hearing loss hears are the vowels or the base sounds in a word.  This is why the biggest complaint with our patients is, “I can hear but just can’t make out the words.”  Read more... (279 words, estimated 1:07 mins reading time)

Everyone today wants to get their money’s worth regardless of what they are purchasing.  I think we have all purchased something high priced and later found it just wasn’t what it was advertised.

I can tell you for sure that there is a huge difference between hearing aid manufactures, especially in the results and benefit provided for patients. I have learned my lesson the hard way.  I made the mistake of believing what manufactures told me about their hearing aids’ performance levels.  I believed them when they told me their hearing aid would accurately correct my patients hearing loss.  I believed them when they told me their instruments would help people hear better in noisy situations.  I believed what I saw on their fitting screens while using their software when I fit a patient with their hearing aid.  I believed them when they said they had a new circuit or technology that would make a huge difference for my patients.  Read more... (276 words, estimated 1:06 mins reading time)

Moisture will build up on the electrical components inside your instrument usually very slowly.  Signs of moisture are crackling or distortion of sound. Your hearing aid performance may be intermittent, sometimes it sounds good and then other times it doesn’t. It may even go on/off at times. All makes and models are affected by moisture.

What can be done?  First of all if you see any moisture or water on your instrument, wipe and clean it off.  Secondly, I recommend every moment your hearing aid isn’t in your ear to put it into a Dri-Aid Kit.  A Dri-Aid Kit usually consists of an absorbent material inside a container of some sort. There are numerous kinds and designs available on the market, some very inexpensive and others quite pricey.  When placing your instrument in the container with the moisture absorbent material, the idea is to draw the moisture out of your hearing aid.  Read more... (258 words, estimated 1:02 mins reading time)

The #2 Enemy

In the last blog I wrote how cerumen, or ear wax, inside the ear canal was enemy number one for causing a hearing aid to perform poorly or not at all.  Second on the list, without any question, is moisture.

If you have worn a hearing aid for any length of time, there’s no doubt you are already aware that moisture can play havoc with the performance of your hearing aid.  Let’s think about where we wear our hearing aids.  Ninety-nine percent of all hearing aids are worn inside the ear canal or behind the ear with some sort of ear piece that directs the sound into the ear.  All models of hearing aids have to endure our body heat and perspiration coming from our bodies.    Read more... (275 words, 1 image, estimated 1:06 mins reading time)

When considering purchasing a hearing aid, one of the most important aspects you should consider is the service provided with your purchase.  All hearing aids sound really good when they are new.  Then people are surprised that the quality of sound doesn’t last or quite often their hearing aid stops performing altogether.  So what could cause a hearing aids performance to diminish or even stop altogether?

Consider where you wear your hearing aid.  If you have a behind-the-ear model it will rest behind your ear, next to your skull and your ear flap.  From the part sitting behind your ear there is a piece of tubing or wire that comes around the top of your ear flap down into your ear canal. If you wear an in-the-ear hearing aid, then you have the complete devise fitting inside the ear canal.  Read more... (323 words, estimated 1:18 mins reading time)