MANAGING YOUR HEARING AID

Now that you have purchased your hearing aids you will enjoy hearing the sounds of life again. Proper care and maintenance will ensure that you continue to hear and will reduce the need for repairs. You should have received an Owner’s Manual that is written for your specific hearing aid. It should provide clear information about the use and care.

Regular Maintenance Guide

Having a regular routine is important.

There are two main components to the maintenance of your hearing aids.

1. cleaning the hearing aid (and/or earmold)
2. changing the battery

• Cleaning – If you clean your hearing aids every day, you will prevent wax from blocking up the receiver opening. If the receiver opening, where the sound comes out, becomes completely plugged, your hearing aid will not work. If it is partially plugged you can experience problems like distortion or feedback (squealing). Audiologist will give you a wax loop or a brush that can be used for cleaning.

• Battery – Knowing when to change the battery can be difficult at first. Finding a way that works for you is important. Here are a few options and/or suggestions.

• When you change your battery, put the “tab” that you took off the back of your battery on your calendar two weeks from that date. That way you can predict when you are going to need to change your battery.

• Some people purchase a battery tester and test the battery when their hearing aid stops working to make sure it is the battery that is not working before they change it.

• Some people change their battery at regular intervals, every two weeks whether the battery is dead or not. Usually a time period is chosen that is short enough that the battery is unlikely to go dead before that time.

Optional Maintenance

• Dehumidifier – The average individual has about a pint of moisture that comes through their skin every day. When you put a hearing aid in your ear, the hearing aid is subject to that moisture. Also, condensation occurs in hearing aids. If you are in a cool indoor environment and then go outside into a hot and often humid environment, condensation will form inside the aid. Audiologists recommend putting your hearing aids in a dehumidifier at night so it can dry out. Many people report that their hearing aids work much better when they do so.