Hearing Aids - Blog Posts

The Veterans Affairs Department is taking weeks to provide or repair hearing aids for its patients, leaving hearing-impaired veterans at risk in the latest failure by the agency charged with caring for America’s war heroes.The VA has promised to provide hearing aids within five days, but the agency’s inspector general found that the average wait time was between 17 and 24 days. About 30 percent of veterans are waiting 30 days or more, and of those, 10 percent are waiting to have their hearing aids fixed for two months or more, a report released last week found.Read more here http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2014/feb/21/veterans-wait-weeks-hearing-aids-veterans-affairsBy...

Could the smell of your EARWAX reveal where you've been, what you've eaten and even if you are gay? Scientists say substance is 'overlooked source of personal information' Researchers found earwax can carry similar information to underarm odour Could include information about personal identity, gender, sexual orientation, and health status Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2559794/Could-EARWAX-reveal-youve-youve-eaten-GAY-Scientists-say-substance-overlooked-source-personal-information.html#ixzz2tmbucABO

Medgadget.com Module stacking enables sensation-free compact hearing aid The Engineer Fraunhofer researchers are developing a new microsystem designed to make hearing aids small enough to be concealed out of sight within the ear.

Wooster Daily Record COLUMBUS -- A Democratic state lawmaker wants health insurers to be required to cover hearing aids. Sen. Edna Brown (D-Toledo) offered SB 257 ... http://www.the-daily-record.com/local%20news/2014/02/09/hearing-aids-may-be-added-to-health-insurance

Microsystems are at the heart of portable hearing aids and implants. Now researchers are developing a miniature, low-power wireless microsystem to make these medical aids smaller, more comfortable and more efficient.People with impaired hearing struggle with things we take for granted, whether it is listening to birds warbling in the garden or chatting with friends and acquaintances. They experience particular problems with hearing at higher frequencies and by following-up conversations. According to the World Health Organization (WHO), hearing loss is one of the six most common illnesses in the industrialized world. In Germany, around one in five of those over...

Better Hearing Through BluetoothBy TRICIA ROMANO Stuart Isett for The New York Times Larry Faust, 61, uses a Bluetooth-based personalized sound amplification device. Like many men of his generation, Larry Faust, 61, of Seattle, went to a lot of rock concerts in his youth. And like many men of his generation, his hearing isn’t what it used to be.“My wife has been bugging me for several years to do something about my hearing,” said Mr. Faust. “I spent part of the summer of 1969 at Woodstock. So that probably didn’t help.”Instead of going the traditional route — buying hearing aids...

When hearing aids were first made some had wires that went from a box shaped body worn aid to a button receiver in the ear. As time went on the wires got shorter and the hearing aid was worn over the ear. Eventually the wires were gone and all the components were housed in one case that was worn behind the ear. Only those who had profound hearing loss still used body worn hearing aids. Soon just about all hearing aids were “wireless.”Today, the term “wireless” has a whole new meaning when it comes to hearing aids. Wireless means that...

US-based company has designed a hearing aid which looks like a regular necklace that users can wear around their neck.'Wear' is an assistive device designed to improve quality of life for people with hearing loss.The device is a high fidelity directional analog microphone which can be used with any pair of headphones, has a volume control, is rechargeable and comfortable to wear.The 'necklace' incorporates a directional microphone technology that creates a 6 foot zone which captures, focuses and clarifies conversations in noisy environments, while reducing the effects of extraneous noise, according to the product description on Kickstarter website.The team behind...

WHY HEARING AIDS ARE NOT LIKE EYEGLASSES First, how hearings are like eyeglasses -the process anyway. Well Step 1. get eye exam and you can do that at any optometrist. Step 2. get the results..and Step 3. you can then go anywhere to get your glasses - 1800contacts etc. With hearing aids. Step 1. Get a hearing test. 2. Get the results or the audiogram. Step 3. With your audiogram in hand....you can go anywhere to get a hearing aid. - I will talk more about that audiogram in Secret #5 Why are Hearing Aids not like Eyeglasses? A colleague...

Cocktail-party help for the hearing-impairedOSU researchers create computer program that filters out background noiseBy Dean Narciso Clinking glasses; giggling children; and layers of music, laughter and speech weave a blanket of babble for the hearing impaired, making conversation futile and holiday parties a chore.It’s called the “cocktail party problem” — the inability to filter unwanted background noise to focus in on one voice. Solving this problem is considered the Holy Grail of hearing technology.“Satisfaction with hearing aids is notoriously low, and (background noise) is probably the primary reason,” said Eric Healy, the director of the Speech Psychoacoustics Laboratory at Ohio...

Well maybe...old men...and women may have bigger ears than they had as younger adults. Here are some recent studies...A. Researchers at the Veterans Admin Medical Center found that ear circumference increases an average .51 millimeters per year.B. Research in the United Kingdom found the same thing, "A chance observation--ears get bigger when the rest of the body stops growing--was at first controversial, but has shown to be true," Dr James A Heathcote at the Royal College of General Practitioners in England reported.C. Dr Yashhiro Asai, a physician at the Futanazu Clinic in Misake, Japan, along with three colleagues, conducted a...

Is Your Flexible Spending Arrangement (FSA) Expiring on December 31st?Here is the new rule from the IRS:On October 31, 2013, the Internal Revenue Service ("IRS") announced a modification to the "use-it-or-lose-it" rule that applies to health care Flexible Spending Arrangements ("FSAs") under a cafeteria plan. Under the use-it-or-lose-it rule, unused amounts in a participant's health care FSA for a plan year not used to pay eligible medical expenses incurred during the plan year were required to be forfeited to the employer, unless the employer adopted the 2 1/2 month grace period. The grace period rules permit participants to use amounts...