Why People Who Need Hearing Aids Don't Wear Them
Did you know that most people who could benefit from hearing aids don't
wear them? There are a number of reasons. They're expensive, some people
have had a bad experience with them, some people deny their hearing loss,
etc.
April 2004 - You've probably heard the statistics - roughly three in
four people who could benefit from hearing aids don't wear them. Ever
wonder why that is? Here's Mark Ross with his
thought on the subject.
July 2005 - You probably know someone who could wear hearing aids and
would benefit from them, but just chooses not to. What reason do they
offer for not doing something that would help them communicate? I'm sure
some of us have heard some really creative excuses. I know Richard
Wagner has, because he's actually compiled
a list of 123 reasons for not wearing a hearing aid!
January 2006 - Will HiTech Devices Make Hearing Aids
More Acceptable?
February
2006 - Tiny Hearing Aids Cosmetically Appealing
March 2006 - Why one man decided to get hearing aids!
April
2006 - Here's AARP's article on hearing aids
April 2006 - I
can't hear you; I've got cheese in my ear
April
2006 - Oticon Promotes Stylish Hearing Aid
May 2006 -
Will new hearing aids lead to new users?
June 2006 - Daughter publishes newspaper article
to convince mom to get hearing aids.
May 2006 - Public Perception of Hearing Aids
Changing?
May 2006 - Hearing aids and glasses: Leveling
the sensory playing field
September 2006 - Vint Cerf and BHI Address Untreated Hearing Loss
September 2006 - The Hearing Aid as Fashion Statement
September 2006 -
Hearing Loss Is Common, but Often Untreated
May 2007 - Mark Ross' insightful article on
Acceptable Noise Level Helps Explain Why Some People Refuse to Wear
Hearing Aids
December 2007 - Increasing hearing aid adoption through
multiple environmental listening utility
December 2007 - Hearing aids are slow to offer baby
boomers style
December 2007 - Aging Lifestyles: Did you hear the
one about the hearing aid?
June 2008 - Ten years of evolution change mind of
hearing aid buyer
June 2008 - Deal With It: Hearing Loss Is Inevitable
August 2008 - Hearing Aids Are Loud, Hip
September 2008 - Why 80% of Americans with Hearing
Loss Do Not Purchase Hearing Aids
November 2008 - Spanish Mom Embraces Hearing Aid
September 2009 - Try a Hearing Aid - You Might Like
It!
February 2010 - Survey Finds Misperception Around
Hearing Aids Despite Significant Advances In Hearing Technology and Design
August 2010 -
Teach
patients who hear "well enough" the real cost of neglecting hearing loss
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January 2006
Many Americans wouldn't be caught dead wearing a hearing aid, even if
they've lost enough hearing to need one. So hearing-aid suppliers such
as Eden Prairie-based Starkey Laboratories are trying to
broaden their appeal with audiological products for all ages. Think custom-molded earpieces
for teenage iPod junkies along with Bluetooth cell-phone headsets for
their car-commuting moms and dads, to name a few. The idea, according to
Starkey, is to get consumers more comfortable with advanced in-the-ear
technologies, and to remove the stigma associated with hearing aids, so
they'll be likelier to embrace the audio-assistance devices when the
time is right. Full
Story
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
February
2006
As
the components inside hearing aids have become miniaturized, the hearing
aids themselves also have become miniaturized. Hearing aids now fit in
or on the ear itself, and some hearing aids fit entirely in the ear
canal. This style is appropriately called a completely-in-the-canal
hearing aid or CIC aid. Although this style of hearing aid was first
introduced in 1983, it is still the smallest aid available today. There
are advantages and disadvantages to this style of hearing aid. Full
Story
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
March
2006
Frustrated
by her husband's lack of responsiveness and his unwillingness to admit
that he had a hearing problem, Diane Moskowitz opted for a creative
solution. "One night, she asked me how I was going to know when she
wanted to have sex if I didn't have a hearing aid," recalls Rick
Seifert, a former Daily News reporter. "I said, 'Why would I need a
hand grenade to know when you want to have sex?" Shortly
thereafter, Rick purchased a hearing aid. Unfortunately, not everyone
takes action. Full
Story
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
April
2006
Are
you sick of hearing (just barely) from friends and family that you can't
hear? If so, the time has come to stop stalling and buy a hearing aid.
Twelve million Americans 55 and up have age-related hearing loss, yet
people wait seven years, on average, to seek treatment. The reason?
Often, it's vanity. There's an everyone-will-stare-at-me stigma that
makes us more worried about how we look than how we listen. But hearing
aids have never been less noticeable-or more effective. "I actually
feel younger, smarter, and happier since I got mine," says Sandra
Betzina, 63, an author and a sewing teacher in San Francisco. Full
Story
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
April
2006
"I'm
going to put on the soup." "A Boy Scout troop at your
age?" "No, soup. For supper." "You mean soup? Stop
mumbling." "I NEVER mumble. Soup, pea soup." 'I don't
need to pee." And so it went. My wife would not wear her hearing
aids, and it was the only thing in 14 years of Parkinson's care that
made me cross. But after my wife passed away, I stopped wearing mine.
Why won't Grandma and Grandpa wear their hearing aids? That's the
question about aging I hear the most. It comes before nursing homes,
living wills, who's leaving what to whom, as children in the sandwich
generation face the cost of sending their kids to college and their
parents to the old folks' home. Full
Story
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
May 2006
At first,
awareness dawns that you are struggling to follow conversations amid
babble and noise. Soon "your family and close friends joke about your
getting deaf," says Joanne Pogue, 74, who as president of the library
board in Washington, Maine, recalls finding it harder with each meeting to
hear board members around the large table. "I joked about it." Better,
perhaps, than to be patronized ("Uncle Jim, do you want me to listen to
the specials and order for you?") or treated as barely there. Locked in
growing silence, older people with impaired hearing often withdraw and
grow isolated. Studies show they may even die before their time.
Full Story
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
June 2006
Have you ever thought about publishing an article in
a newspaper to convince a loved one to get much-needed hearing aids? It
does sound like a good idea, right? Well Nancy Christenson, the assistant
editorial page editor of the Honolulu Star-Bulletin, did exactly that to
convince her mom to consider getting aids. And it worked!
Full Story
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
September 2006
THIS hearing
aid looks more like an earring. Its tiny triangular body comes in exuberant
colors like sunset orange, racing green or cabernet red; a slender wisp of
wire uncoils gracefully from the body to an earpod no bigger than a
teardrop. But it is indeed a hearing appliance, made by the Danish company
Oticon. It is called Delta, after its triangular housing that contains the
microphones and signal-processing electronics. Introduced in May, the device
is designed for people typically in their 40’s, 50’s or older who are
starting to lose the ability to hear high-pitched sounds but hate doing
anything about it.
Full Story
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
September 2006
Conversations with my elderly aunt alternate between
being comical and frustrating. I might say to her, “My grandsons are now
swimming like fish,” and she will reply, “My friend’s dog died yesterday.”
If I should ask, “What is your granddaughter doing this summer?” she is
likely to reply with something like, “I went shopping in Brooklyn
yesterday.” Though her mind remains razor sharp and she maintains an
independent life in her late 80’s, her hearing is so poor that most people
soon give up trying to engage her in conversation, unless they happen to
enjoy such non sequiturs. But though family members have been urging her for
years to get a hearing aid, she has refused, saying, “They’re too much
trouble,” or that a friend had one and didn’t like it (although this friend
wears hers every day).
Full Story
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
December 2007
Customer satisfaction with hearing aids is strongly
associated with what we call “multiple environmental listening utility” or
MELU. When consumers are satisfied with their ability to function in many
listening situations, their overall satisfaction is very high. When they are
satisfied in few situations, their overall satisfaction is very low. We have
previously shown a very strong relationship between satisfaction and the
number of environments in which consumers derive utility from their hearing
aids. We are estimating that overall satisfaction with hearing aids will not
reach a respectable 80% level until consumers are at least “somewhat”
satisfied with their hearing aids in at least 70% of the listening
environments important to them.
Full Story
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
December 2007
However, the worst thing about hearing aids is that
they carry an odd social connotation that suggests that the wearer is
infirm. Eyeglass wearers don't get this kind of treatment, but wearing
hearing aids is taken as a sign of aging. Hearing does naturally deteriorate
as we age, but we don't need another reminder that we're not kids anymore;
it's painfully obvious every time we get up for a run. Hearing-aid
manufacturers don't help the situation much either; they're used to catering
to a relatively small, exclusive market that seems to care little about how
devices look or function in respect to current design and technologies. When
compared with other electronic devices, such as the iPod, for instance,
hearing aids seem stuck in the stone age. Today's iPods boast 30 times the
capacity of the 5-year-old original and include a host of features while
maintaining the same unit cost. Hearing aids, on the other hand, have been
around for decades and have changed little. Most are still ugly, bulky,
annoying devices.
Full Story
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June 2008
Daniel Cardwell, an engineer from Summit, N.J., knew
he'd been missing out on conversations, business discussions and movie
dialogue for a long time. He looked at hearing aids 10 year ago, but they
"were big, bulky and beige," he says. "Plus, I didn't think they worked very
well." Bowing to pressure from his family, Cardwell, 60, recently tried
again. "This time the digital technology really impressed me," he says, "and
the instruments are small, almost invisible." Cardwell also had his pick of
colors-including ice blue, espresso or gold dust. He chose gray to match his
hair. These are the sleek, chic, powerful hearing aids of the 21st century,
designed for the more than 20 million people ages 45 and up who need them.
"We discovered that technology could only take us so far in attracting
first-time users," says Gordon Wilson, vice president of marketing for
Oticon, a hearing aid manufacturer based in Somerset, N.J. Style is
important, too.
Full Story
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June 2008
OK. So this is something you don't want to deal
with. I mean, you figure if you just turn up the volume on your iPod or lean
toward the folks speaking, no one will notice that you have a hearing loss.
Because nothing makes you feel older than having a hearing loss and
requiring a - gasp! - hearing aid. Truth is, hearing loss is inevitable
after age 50, says Tom Powers, audiologist and vice president of Siemens
Hearing Instruments. Some 30 million Americans have hearing loss, far more
than have some well-known health conditions related to aging, including
diabetes (20 million), Alzheimer's disease (4.5 million) and Parkinson's
(1.5 million). "Still, there is a real stigma," Powers says. "Many people
will say, 'huh?' and ignore the fact that they have a hearing loss. They
pretend no one will notice. "In fact, they could have a hearing aid that no
one will notice and that's a lot better than saying 'huh?'"
Full Story
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
August 2008
How can you make a hearing aid sexy? You call it
"Passion" and color it shocking pink or lipstick red. You call it "Vibe" and
dress it in leopard print or checkered flag that looks positively NASCAR.
Manufacturers are banking on such flash to attract baby boomers who have
punished their ears with loud concerts and music played through headphones.
Of 78 million boomers, one in six is estimated to have hearing loss. The
latest in hearing aids were on display at the Charlotte Convention Center
this spring at the annual conference of the American Academy of Audiology.
"It's about self-expression," said company rep Tom Powers, standing near a
giant photo of an attractive young woman at one convention booth. In her ear
was the Vibe, a device the size and shape of a fake fingernail. But instead
of blending in with her skin, it bore a bold pattern just like her
leopard-print blouse.
Full Story
