Contemporary cell phones have become a lot clearer and more dependable nowadays. But that doesn’t mean everyone can hear you all the time. And for individuals who have hearing loss, it can be particularly difficult.
Now, you may be thinking: there’s a simple remedy for that, right? Can’t you use some hearing aids to help you understand phone conversations more clearly? Actually, it doesn’t work exactly that way. Even though hearing aids can help with conversations, with phone conversations it can be a little more difficult. But there are a few tips for phone calls with hearing aids that can help you get a bit more from your next conversation.
Phone calls and hearing aids don’t always work effectively together – here’s why
Hearing loss usually advances gradually. It isn’t like someone simply turns down the general volume on your ears. It has a tendency to go a little at a time. It’s likely that you won’t even notice you have hearing loss and your brain will attempt to utilize contextual and visual clues to compensate.
When you talk on the phone, you no longer have these visual hints. There’s no added information for your brain to fill in. There’s only a really distorted voice and you only hear bits and pieces of the spectrum of the other individual’s voice.
How hearing aids can help
Hearing aids will help with this. Lots of those missing pieces can be filled in by using hearing aids. But there are a few distinctive accessibility and communication challenges that happen from using hearing aids while talking on the phone.
For example, putting your hearing aids near a phone speaker can cause some harsh speaker-to-speaker interference. This can make things difficult to hear and uncomfortable.
Tips to enhance the phone call experience
So what measures can be taken to help make your hearing aids work better with a phone? Well, there are a number of tips that most hearing specialists will endorse:
- Be truthful with the individual you’re speaking with on the phone: It’s all right to admit if you’re having trouble! You may simply need to be a little extra patient, or you might want to think about switching to text, email, or video chat.
- Consider using speakerphone to conduct most of your phone calls: Most feedback can be averted this way. There may still be some distortion, but your phone conversation should be mostly understandable (if not necessarily private). Knowing how to better hold your phone with hearing aids (that is, away from your ears) is essential, and speakerphone is how you achieve this!
- Use other assistive hearing devices: Devices, including numerous text-to-type services, are available to help you hear better during phone conversations.
- You can use your Bluetooth function on your hearing aid to connect to your phone. Yes, contemporary hearing aids can connect to your smartphone using Bluetooth! This means that if your hearing aids are Bluetooth capable, phone calls can be streamed right to your phone. This can get rid of feedback and make your phone calls a bit more private, so it’s a practical place to begin if you’re having trouble on your phone.
- Find a quiet location to conduct your phone conversations. The less noise around you, the easier it will be to pick out the voice of the person you’re on the phone with. Your hearing aids will be much more effective by reducing background noise.
- Download a video call app: Face-timing someone or hopping onto a video chat can be a great way to help you hear better. The sound won’t be louder or clearer, but at least you’ll have that visual information back. And again, this type of contextual information will be considerably helpful.
Finding the correct set of solutions will depend on what you use the phone for, how often you’re on the phone, and what your overall communication needs are like. With the correct approach, you’ll have the tools you require to begin enjoying those phone conversations again.
Call us for some help and guidance on how to best use your phone and hearing aids at the same time.
