How Hearing Aids Work

There are many types of hearing aids available brought to us by different brands, but the most common type of hearing aid is what we refer to as an air conduction hearing aid.

Components of a Hearing Aid

Such a hearing aid is comprised essentially of four main components: (i) A microphone to pick up surrounding sounds, (ii) a microchip which processes instructions from your hearing professional to deliver specific sounds and volumes to match your hearing levels, (iii) an amplifier to increase the volume of the “picked up” sounds and lastly (iv) a speaker (or “receiver”) to broadcast the sound into your ear canal.

What does this device do? It helps people who cannot hear with their levels of hearing, to hear better and more clearly as the hearing aid increases the volume of sound reaching the user’s ears, helping them hear when they could not do so without a hearing aid.

Advanced, digital hearing aids of today

The main difference in today’s modern hearing devices compared with devices of yesteryear is the sophistication of the microcomputers which control the hearing aid and allow it to function with instant precision to deliver both audibility and hearing comfort.

What do these microcomputers do?

• Process input from multiple microphones on your hearing aid and in split seconds, determine the speech signals your hearing aid should be focused on. It then provides selective amplification to the speech and mutes surround noises.  This allows the user to hear speech signals better than noises.
• Able to differentiate and create hearing channels/bands of up to 48 channels (for the most sophisticated hearing aids). This allows a very precise and natural delivery of sounds to the user, as the amplification can match the needs of the user point for point.
• Have you heard high-pitched whistling sounds from hearing aids before? Such incidents hardly occur in today’s hearing aids as the devices can detect the slightest feedback once it occurs, eliminating the sounds causing the feedback before the user perceives it.
• Links with your other wireless devices – like your smartphone, to communicate directly. This allows functions like video and music live streaming and voice calls to be heard directly through your hearing aid from your smartphone. You can even control your hearing aid program volumes via your smartphone and even locate your hearing aids should you misplace them. In a technologically savvy society like Singapore or Malaysia, hearing aid integration with your smartphones is a helpful function to have.

Find out more about what today’s 21st century, modern and advanced hearing devices can do for you. The Listening Lab provides a no-obligations, totally free demonstration of these hearing aids for you. Contact a hearing professional from The Listening Lab today.