Recognizing when you need some medical advice is normally pretty easy. When you break your leg, for instance, you know you should go to the doctor (or the emergency room, depending on the scenario). With situations like this, simply “toughing it out” isn’t a possibility. If you want your bones to mend properly, you need to get them treated as soon as possible.
But in terms of hearing aids, it isn’t always so easy to recognize when it’s time to get some help. Hearing loss normally progresses very slowly over time. That means it’s not always simple to know when you might need to begin wearing hearing aids or to put off finding treatment you know could be helpful.
That’s why it’s a good plan to keep an eye out for some particular indicators that you might be losing your ability to communicate. It’s likely time to call us for a consultation if you do detect any.
Hearing aids and hearing loss
Hearing aids are the main method of treatment for hearing loss. But that doesn’t mean everybody who has hearing loss will immediately need a pair of hearing aids. Hearing aids won’t always be beneficial in cases of mild hearing loss. As a result, we may want you to wait before starting to use them. Likewise, you may be advised to wear hearing aids only in specific situations.
In other words, the threshold for requiring hearing aids isn’t always a hearing loss diagnosis.
However, hearing aids will be the ideal solution in many situations. Because hearing loss can be a sneaky and gradual condition, many people don’t get a diagnosis until there’s been substantial damage. Getting your hearing assessed regularly is the key to catching hearing loss early and possibly mitigating the need for hearing aids.
And if that’s the case, you’re probably thinking: how can I tell if I require hearing aids?
You need hearing aids if you experience these indicators
Hearing loss is one of those conditions that can create instant communication obstacles. The funny thing, though, is that you don’t always comprehend that those communication difficulties are the result of hearing loss. So, when is it time for a hearing aid?
Watch out for these indicators:
- When people talk, you can’t always make out what they said: Many people don’t think they have hearing loss or need hearing aids because the overall volume they perceive seems fine. But the thing about hearing loss is that certain frequencies of sound tend to go before others. Which means that the great majority of sounds might seem ordinary but things in the high frequencies (such as certain vowels) will be distorted. As a result, you might have a hard time understanding what people are saying to you.
- You can’t understand people on the phone: Even the highest quality phone speakers tend to flatten a voice. If you have hearing loss, this can make it even harder to understand conversations. Again, specific frequencies are cut out and the result is that it’s extremely difficult to understand those voices.
- When you’re in very loud settings, you have a hard time following conversations: When people ask, “What are the signs of hearing loss?”, this one is almost always mentioned. One of the surest signs of hearing loss is that you have trouble following conversations in loud settings, like bars or restaurants. That’s because your brain has difficulty filling in the missing information that gets lost with hearing impairment. Because of this, there’s a lot of muffled conversations.
- The volume on your devices is becoming really loud: Hearing loss could be the cause if you continuously need to turn the volume of your devices up. This is particularly true if you keep turning that volume knob higher (and even more especially relevant if the people around you complain about how loud your media is).
So how should you deal with it?
Clearly, you know precisely what you have to do when you break a bone! But what about when you experience these indications that you might need a hearing aid? What level of hearing loss calls for hearing aids? Well, that’s difficult to answer, but when you start noticing these symptoms, it’s a good idea to make an appointment with us. We will be able to let you know how severe your hearing loss is.
And if you do wind up needing hearing aids, a hearing exam will help determine the best device for your hearing needs. This means you’ll be able to get back to spending quality time with your friends and loved ones, you’ll hear your grandkids when they call you on the phone, your co-workers at your morning meeting, and your friends at happy hour.
Contact us to schedule your hearing exam, we can help you recognize if you’re suffering from hearing loss.
