More than 15 to 20 channels can cause sounds to become ‘muddy’. Also, with more channels, the analysis of the sound environment is more accurate, which can enhance the function of other hearing aid features. With more channels, hearing aids can be programmed to more accurately fit your hearing loss. The number of channels available for programming differs among hearing aids. Volume controls may be accessed by a button or volume control wheel on the hearing aid or, in some cases, with a remote control.
#SOUND CONTROL HEARING AIDS MANUAL#
Manual volume controls to change the overall volume are available on many hearing aids. The amount of amplification in each channel can generally be adjusted by your audiologist using the hearing aid programming software. The volume of each channel can be adjusted independently, allowing for certain sounds to be amplified more than others, similar to an equalizer on a stereo. More recently, hearing aids are able to separate sound into different frequency (tonal) regions, called channels. You may often notice this with the volume control settings of your television or radio. You may be decreasing sounds that are too loud, but at the same time decreasing sounds that need to be increased to improve speech understanding. However, for most patients with hearing loss, simply increasing or decreasing the volume does not improve the clarity of speech. This feature minimizes the need to physically adjust a volume control. Gain (volume) Processingįor many years, hearing aids have been able to automatically increase or decrease volume depending on the input sounds. Within digital hearing aids, however, many different features are available and are discussed further in this section.
DSP allows for changes in volume, but can also provide noise reduction and other features to help improve communication in difficult listening environments.Ĭurrently, very few analog hearing aids are available, and most hearing aids contain DSP. Once the digital signal is analyzed and processed using Digital Signal Processing (DSP), it is converted into acoustic sound. The digital signals are then processed by the small computer chip in the hearing aid. With digital hearing aids, a microphone picks up sound, which is then converted into digital signals. However, analog hearing aids do not typically have other advanced features.ĭigital hearing aids are more complex. Analog hearing aids may help amplify soft sounds without over-amplifying loud sounds through a process called automatic gain control (AGC).
They have a microphone to collect sound and convert the sound into electrical energy, an amplifier to increase the strength of the electrical energy, and a receiver or speaker to convert the electrical energy to an acoustic sound. Features of Hearing Aid Technology Analog versus Digital Hearing AidsĪnalog hearing aids have been available for many years.
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