I don't think I have a problem. Why should I buy now?

This is something I hear a lot in the office, especially from people who have a moderate high frequency loss. The reason you should treat a hearing loss early is because it will help you keep your ability to understand speech as you get older. Hearing loss is one of those things that creeps up on you in a very subtle and insidious way -- almost to the point where you don't know you have a problem until a lot of damage has been done that you don't even realize it until you have a major problem and incredibly isolated. Catching and treating it early will save you a lot of grief further on down the road as well as increase your overall earning power if you are still working.

With aids costing around $6500-$7000 per pair at the high end, it's no wonder people in the early stages of a hearing loss don't get help -- the price and bother of using them is simply too high compared to the value. Yet before you drive a stake of holly through your hearing care professional's heart when he tells you about your problem, keep this in mind: he's only trying to spare you worse pain further on down the line as well as help you get a leg up on life. If your doctor said that you were in the early stages of a treatable cancer or that he saw a precancerous lesion, wouldn't you want that treated?

It's a similar story with hearing loss. Very often the first areas of hearing that are affected are the soft middle to high frequencies. This is important because those frequencies carry the consonant sounds that give definition to our language. To hear what that sounds like, try listening to an mp3, CD, etc. through a stereo system with the treble turned down a bit and the bass and mid set at the middle. Odds are, the sound will be muddy without a ton of definition. Your average person with a hearing loss hears like this every day and doesn't even know it. This loss of definition costs relationships, jobs and a whole bunch of other things as without this definition, there is little to no understanding of speech.

That's not the only dimension to this either. This is because of the neurological component to this as well because the nerves in the brain that handled the consonants get lazy the longer they don't get used. Like muscles, they atrophy and retask. As the cochlea looses its ability to process those frequencies, more nerves fall offline. Further, as we get older, our brains get more and more brittle and less able to adapt to new situations, allowing a hearing loss to get worse and worse and worse without the victim even knowing it. Then when they don amplification for the first time, they end up overwhelmed and start cursing their aids and considering their hearing care professional to be Beelzebub himself.

Getting help for a hearing loss early saves most of if not all of that. When a developing hearing loss is treated early, it keeps the nerves that process the consonants active. This in turn will make sure you hear speech clearly for years to come. This will further improve your relationships with people and give you a much happier life. One person I've fitted wears both glasses and hearing aids and he's in his early 30s. He technically only needs the glasses for reading and using the computer, but he wears them all the time because he sees that much better with them on. Likewise, his hearing loss is mild to moderate. He does fine without his hearing aids. When he wears them however, he finds himself much better able to function in life. those around him notice that he doesn't have to shout or have things repeated quite as much and does better at his job. With that kind of quality of life improvement possible, along with the fact that to my knowledge, hearing aids are considered by the IRS to be a medical expense and therefore are tax deductible, why not get a mild to moderate loss treated? The benefits even in the short term well outweigh the cost. Further, styles are so discreet these days that barely anybody is going to notice that you're wearing hearing aids unless they are looking entirely too closely at you. We spend our lives these days with Bluetooth earpieces on and tunes coming to us in our earbuds, which are far more noticeable than a pair of properly tuned hearing aids that help you not only survive today's hyper competitive business and social environment.

Hearing Aid Maintinence 101

These days, with hearing aids costing what they do, basic maintenance more important now than it ever was in the past. This is because Hearing Aids spend most of their time in an environment that is utterly hostile to them. As electronic devices, even though they are coated and treated to take moisture, they much prefer a cool, dry environment and the human ear is the opposite of that. Because of this, it's very important that hearing aid users and their caregivers know the basics of how to take care of hearing aids, so if you either use hearing aids or help somebody who does, this is for you.

Rule Number One: Keep them as clean and dry as possible.
This means brushing them off before you go to bed, keeping as much wax out of the receiver and tube as possible, and keeping them in their open case -- unless you have cats, dogs or other pets, then keep the case closed. The reason for this is it lets them dry out after spending 10+ hours in the warm moisture of your ear canal. This is probably the most important thing you can do to make sure your investment lasts its full life, as it gives the electronics a break so that things like contact corrosion and fouling don't happen as often if at all. Also, please check your ears before you step into the shower, the tub or go swimming to make sure you aren't wearing your hearing aids -- they really don't like water. If for any reason they do get wet, dry them off with a blow dryer set on cool air only -- the hot setting will damage the electronics and you don't want to do that to something you spent $3000+ each on.

Rule Number Two: Keep your clean and check appointments.
You wouldn't expect your car to last if you didn't take it in for it's oil change every 3000 miles, yet people seem to expect the same of their hearing aids. A clean and check appointment is like going to get your car's oil changed, except it usually takes less time. In this appointment, your hearing aids and molds are taken into the lab and intensively cleaned. Since the tubes on traditional Behind The Ear hearing aids very often get brittle, they are usually changed as well. After that the hearing aids are dried out and put back on you. If the tube was changed, your hearing care professional may refit the tube on you to make sure it fits right. This intensive cleaning again, helps maintain the electronics and other components of the two (or one) computers you are wearing that are helping you stay connected to the outside world.

Both of these rules are related because the main thing you need to do to maintain hearing aids is above all to keep them clean and dry. The clean and check appointment allows your hearing care professional to assist you in doing this. With your car, they recommend that you check your oil level whenever you fill your gas tank and that you go in for an oil change every 3000 miles. Your dentist recommends that you brush your teeth twice a day, change your toothbrush every 3 months and get a professional cleaning every 6 months to keep your teeth in good shape. The same applies for your hearing aids. Therefore, why not take the small amount of time it takes to maintain them, since they are an investment in your health?

Hearing Well, Being Well

Welcome to Hearing Well, Being Well. This blog is about hearing health care and related issues. This covers not just hearing aids, for those of us who need them, but also hearing protection and common sense. Hearing is one of our most important senses as it does the most to connect us to others, yet it's not that well understood by the public at large. By posting here, I hope to be able to help educate people about this very important sense of ours.

As a Hearing Aid Specialist, I deal with these issues on a day to day basis and look forward to helping us learn more broadly about hearing health, what this sense does for us, and the benefits and limitations of hearing aids for those who need them.

Until next time,

Auditor Maximus.