Aside from getting coupons and notifications of special deals, I also give my newsletter subscribers the chance to ask me questions directly. This way, I hope to help you even more with personalized advice. One of my readers did reach out with a question, and I thought others might benefit from my answers, too.
I have edited the emails a little to make it easier to read the question and answer, and taken out any personal information. I hope this may answer your questions, too, and if not, please subscribe to my newsletter to ask your own.
One disclaimer: I’m not a trained hearing professional. I cannot give you medical advice. I have done a lot of research into hearing amplifiers, and my advice is only a breakdown of that research for a particular situation.
The reader’s email
Hi Bas,
I need some help/input in selecting an amplifier and if I even need one. Here’s the situation:
HEARING TESTS:
Gradually losing higher end hearing. About the same in both ears. Over the last few months I’ve had to ask my wife to repeat things every now and then. Background noise in restaurants has impaired my hearing clearly over the last few years. TV; etc in okay.
ME:
– gray/silver hair
– 79 years old/fairly active
– prefer: * long battery life or rechargeable (1st preference)
* ability to minimize/cancel backgroud noise
* no whistling
* good sound clarity
* easy to operate, don’t want complicated
* wear glasses all day
* probably want a BTE
* willing to spend up to about $250 for each
– have not ever worn a hearing aid of any type.
Reader questions:
– Do I even need a hearing amplifier?
– From all the reading, these seem like possibilities:
* Banglijian Rechargeable Digital Noise Cancelling Hearing Aid
* One of other Banglijian Models
* Neosonic MX (more expensive)
– Based on all your experience which one(s) would you recommend IF a hearing amplifier makes sense.
– Any other comment?
Bas, I really appreciate your help. Thanks for your time.
Take care and have a great week,
Okay, so I didn’t really edit that, but I did add some links to reviews that this reader mentions. As you can probably tell, there are quite some questions at the same time, and below is where I tackle them one by one:
My Answers:
Dear reader,
From what I can tell, you’re in a great position to start with hearing amplifiers. Let me tell you why.
Hearing loss is a gradual process. Usually, you realize you need a hearing amplifier well after you actually need one. At the same time, your brain needs to adjust to wearing a hearing amplifier.
So what usually happens is that people start wearing them, but then experience such a shift that it’s a big change and a major adjustment. After a while, your brain has gotten used to getting less impulses, and when you suddenly ‘turn on’ all those sounds, it’s a lot.
When you start wearing hearing amplifiers, you adapt with your brain. The earlier you do this, the more control you have over how you adapt. In short, you’re going to have to train your brain to handle all the ‘new’ sounds it will experience.
Buying recommendations
I believe the Banglijian Ziv-201a might fit you best. They’re not all that fancy, but they’re made for people with glasses, have a low dB peak gain, come with standard noise optimizing features, are rechargeable, and available for a good price.
The other models you name are technically all better, but a bigger investment and I imagine you only pop these in every once in a while. If these help you, you could always switch to a fancier model later on, when you notice a regression again.
Thanks again for your question, and have a great week.
Bas
I hope you got something out of these answers, too. If you’d like to ask your own question, please subscribe to my email newsletter below and send me an email: