It just feels great to find a bargain, right? Getting a great deal can be thrilling, and more gratifying the bigger the deal. It’s a little too easy, then, to make the cost your primary consideration, to always go for the least expensive option, to let your coupons make your consumer decisions for you. But chasing a bargain when it comes to buying hearing aids can be a big oversight.
If you require hearing aids to manage hearing loss, choosing the “cheapest” option can have health consequences. Avoiding the development of health issues such as depression, dementia, and the danger of a fall is the entire point of using hearing aids in the first place. The key is to find the hearing aid that best suits your lifestyle, your hearing needs, and your budget.
Tips for picking affordable hearing aids
Affordable is not equivalent cheap. Affordability, and functionality, are what you should be keeping your eye on. This will help you keep within your budget while allowing you to get the ideal hearing aids for your personal needs and budget. These tips will help.
Tip #1: Research before you buy: Affordable hearing aids exist
Hearing aid’s reputation for being incredibly pricey is not necessarily reflected in the reality of the situation. Most hearing aid manufacturers will partner up with financing companies to make the device more budget friendly and also have hearing aids in a wide range of prices. If you’ve already decided that the most reliable hearing aids are too expensive, you’re probably more inclined to search the bargain bin than look for affordable and reliable options, and that can have a long-term, detrimental impact on your hearing and overall health.
Tip #2: Ask what’s covered
Insurance might cover some or all of the expenses associated with getting a hearing aid. Some states, in fact, have laws mandating insurance companies to cover hearing aids for kids or adults. Asking never hurts. There are government programs that often provide hearing aids for veterans.
Tip #3: Look for hearing aids that can be tuned to your hearing loss
Hearing aids are, in some ways, similar to prescription glasses. The frame is pretty universal (depending on your sense of fashion, of course), but the prescription is adjusted for your distinct needs. Similarly, hearing aids might look alike cosmetically, but each hearing aid is calibrated to the individual user’s hearing loss needs.
You won’t get the same benefits by grabbing some cheap hearing device from the clearance shelf (or any helpful results at all in many instances). These are more like amplification devices that increase the sound of all frequencies, not only the ones you’re having difficulty hearing. What’s the importance of this? Hearing loss is usually uneven, you can hear certain frequencies and voices, but not others. If you raise the volume enough to hear the frequencies that are low, you’ll make it uncomfortable in the frequencies you can hear without a device. Simply put, it doesn’t actually solve the problem and you’ll wind up not using the cheaper device.
Tip #4: Not all hearing aids have the same features
There’s a temptation to view all of the great technology in modern hearing aids and think that it’s all extra, just bells and whistles. But you will need some of that technology to hear sounds properly. The specialized technology in hearing aids can be dialed in to the user’s level of hearing loss. Background noise can be filtered out with many of these modern models and some can communicate with each other. In addition, taking into account where (and why) you’ll be using your aids will help you decide on a model that fits your lifestyle.
That technology is essential to compensate for your hearing loss in a healthy way. A little speaker that turns the volume up on everything is far from the sophistication of a modern hearing aid. And that brings up our last tip.
Tip #5: A hearing amplification device is not a hearing aid
Alright, say this with me: a hearing amplification device is not a hearing aid. This is the most important takeaway from this article. Because hearing amplification devices try very hard to make you believe they work the same way as a hearing aid for a fraction of the cost. But that simply isn’t true.
Let’s break it down. An amplifier:
- Takes all sounds and makes them louder.
- Is typically built cheaply.
- Provides the user with little more than basic volume controls (if that).
A hearing aid, conversely:
- Will help you preserve the health of your hearing.
- Has highly qualified specialists that adjust your hearing aids to your hearing loss symptoms.
- Is tuned to amplify only the frequencies you have difficulty hearing.
- Can be programed to recognize specific sound profiles, like the human voice, and amplify them.
- Has long-lasting batteries.
- Has the capability to adjust settings when you change locations.
- Can minimize background noise.
- Can be molded specifically to your ears for maximum comfort.
Your ability to hear is too crucial to go cheap
Everyone has a budget, and that budget is going to limit your hearing aid choices no matter what price range you’re looking in.
That’s why we normally highlight the affordable part of this. When it comes to hearing loss, the long term advantages of hearing loss treatment and hearing aids is well recognized. That’s why you should work on an affordable solution. Don’t forget, cheap is less than your hearing deserves.”