A Product Endorsement: Hearing Aids
Don't waste your money on brick-and-mortar hearing-aid providers.
I have used hearing aids for 16 years. My first pair (Siemens) cost $3,900 in 2006. My second pair (Oticon) cost $6,700 in 2013. My third pair (Oticon) cost $7,500 (including recharger and TV audio-streaming device) in 2019. I bought all three pairs from brick-and-mortar audiologists.
The first Oticons were the best of the three pairs. I especially liked them because they were good at focusing on the person sitting across from me in a noisy restaurant. Also, the sound quality was good. I went to a new pair of Oticons only because my hearing had deteriorated. But the newer Oticons, despite many adjustments (at $50 a pop), were never as good as the first ones in noisy settings. Then, after only three years of use, the right hearing aid died.
I had been reading about how good over-the-counter (OTC) hearing aids have become, and was persuaded by this well-researched article to try Jabra Enhance Select 200 devices. The alternative was driving to a brick-and-mortar audiologist (during the holidays!) and getting stuck with an expensive repair bill for a hearing aid that wasn’t delivering the goods when it was working.
Wow! I took an online hearing test, got the results immediately, ordered the Jabras, and received them in three days (via FedEX). I charged them (charger included), popped them into my ears (a perfect fit), and was introduced to a new and better — and much less expensive — world of hearing. I paid $1,845 for the pair (after an online discount of $150). That’s right, for about 25 percent of the cost of my highly rated Oticons, the Jabras deliver better sound and a lot of other things:
more precise volume control
equalization of treble, bass, and mid-range sounds
filtering out background sounds
delivering “crisper” speech to my ears (there’s a setting for that)
adjusting for the ambiance (normal, restaurant, music, outdoors)
three years of Zoom and telephone consultations with audiologists to answer questions, resolve problems, and make adjustments.
All I had to do (aside from paying for the hearing aids) was to take the simple online hearing test (for which bluetooth headphones are needed). The hearing aids arrived already programmed, based on the results of the test. Perhaps they’ll need some adjustments — I’ll find out in my first Zoom consultation next week — but they’re already far superior to the defunct Oticons.
A final note. The article linked above recommends the Jabra Enhance Select 200 devices (and other OTC hearing aids) for persons with mild to moderate hearing loss. Well, my hearing loss is severe, but the Jabras are more than adequate to the task of restoring my hearing to normal.