The Gift that Keeps on Giving How Hearing Aids Can Enhance Your Loved Ones' Lives
Social connections are one of the keys to having a good quality of life. Imagine you took your parents to a restaurant and all the family members from all over the world came just to join the family dinner, but you noticed that your parents struggle to engage in the conversations and often answer the questions wrongly. The situation drives you to seek a solution and a hearing assessment appointment was scheduled. Eventually you found out that your loved ones having hearing loss.
What is a hearing aid?
Hearing aids have been proven in research in improving speech comprehension and reducing the impact of hearing loss. A hearing aid is a medical device for people with hearing loss, it will enhance sound that a person cannot hear which further helps them to comprehend speech better. A hearing aid consists of basic parts of microphone, amplifier and speaker in which the microphone will pick up the sound and transmit to electrical signal, the amplifier will enhance the signal, and the speaker will change the signal to sound to your ears.
Modern hearing aids are complete with a lot of features which will help people with hearing loss in challenging listening situations such as in noisy restaurants or in a park. The noise reduction feature will lower the background noise and directional microphone improved pickup of sounds when you are in a noisy situation. Technology nowadays also equips the hearing aids with wireless connection option and most of the hearing aids are able to adjust via remote control.
What happened after my loved one got him/her hearing aids?
Audiologists usually will fine tune the hearing aid according to each individual hearing profile and further provide aural rehabilitation to the individual to maximize the benefit of hearing aids. Using hearing aids is a process, when your loved one first fitted with the hearing aids, the audiologist will walk you through the aural rehabilitation process. A few appointments needed after the hearing aids were fitted to ensure the optimum benefit and experience from the devices, several tests needed to be done for hearing aid’s verification and validation to ensure the device is in optimum performance. Fine tuning is crucial for an optimum benefit experience and audiologist usually will fine tune the hearing aid with client’s feedback, results from hearing aid validation and verification test.
How will hearing aids change my loved one’s life?
Hearing loss affects the quality of life and relationships causing loneliness, frustration as well as communication disorder. Hearing aids relieve the strain of hearing and improve the ability to listen in noisy environments. Your loved ones will be able to communicate better and build a better relationship. Better hearing also keeps your loved one’s brain active and further reduces the risk of dementia. Good hearing also improves the safety of your loved ones as they are more aware of their environment. Study had shown that people who used hearing aids have lower chance in fall as they have more sound awareness about their environment and less brain resources used in listening thus more resources in focusing on balance.
It is important to have a hearing check as soon as possible for your loved ones if you start to suspect your loved ones having hearing difficulty. Early detection and intervention can prevent your loved ones from suffering the impacts of hearing loss and continue to engage in daily communication.
Ashley Ng, Clinical Audiologist at 20dB Hearing Bukit Mertajam
