Exploring Solutions: Navigating Hearing Loss Treatment Choices
If you or a loved one are ready for hearing healthcare, one of the first discussions to have with your specialist is which treatment is right for you; there might be more options than you had ever imagined.
Remember, this is not 1982 or 1992. It is not 2002 or even 2012. Today’s technology isn’t anything like it used to be—even if you or a loved one first started treating hearing loss only 5 years ago—things have changed significantly. Today’s hearing healthcare is far more advanced, more sophisticated, and more patient-centered than any prior generation has experienced. If you or a family member had traditional hearing aids, it was medieval torture. Thankfully, the dungeon is gone too, replaced by ultra-modern patient comfort friendly offices.
If you are like most people, you associate the hearing office with traditional hearing aids, but times change and so does the medical treatment of hearing loss and tinnitus. Since we hear with our brains, not our ears, it is important that the technology you use to treat your hearing loss is designed to address the cognitive needs of hearing loss. Traditional hearing aids make sounds louder—all sounds—which is annoying and gets in the way of hearing what others have to say. New technology, sometimes referred to as NeuroTechnology™, helps you hear more naturally, in all listening environments, including noisy restaurants.
Using traditional hearing aids to treat hearing loss is like using a hammer to juice an orange (that was the most ridiculous analogy we could come up with, so we hope it gets our point across!). When it comes to treating hearing loss, there are many factors to consider including stage of hearing loss, experience of tinnitus, impact of hearing loss on memory and cognitive function, etc. Thus, using a device to treat hearing loss that is solely designed to amplify all sounds is rather ridiculous and limiting.
Today’s treatment options come with near limitless choices to customize and be prescribed specific to a patient’s hearing loss symptoms and cognitive needs. As an example, new technology can seamlessly perform in different listening environments by adapting stimulation patterns to suit the person’s needs. New technology also offers the benefits of truly being hands-free. We often liken new technology to the infomercial adage ‘set it and forget it’. You can listen to your phone through new technology, you can listen to the TV through the new technology (no more arguing over the TV volume!), it can alert family members when you fall, it can even be programmed to turn on your coffee maker every morning.
People who live with normal hearing never really have to think about their hearing. Hearing is a natural process that requires little, if any, effort. People with hearing loss deserve the same—and we can now offer each patient the ease of ‘normal’ hearing.
Oh, and did we mention—all our treatment technology is invisible! We have always believed that our priority is to meet the hearing, tinnitus, and cognitive needs of each patient. We also accept that many patients’ priority is vanity. Now we can easily achieve both!
