Are you excited to treat your hearing loss and start the next chapter of your life with clear hearing? If you’ve decided to invest in your hearing health, improve your relationships, and reduce your chances of developing dementia, you’re ready for hearing aids. One of the most common questions we get about hearing aids is – are two hearing aids really better than one? 90% of the time, the answer to this question is yes.
Does My Good Ear Really Need a Hearing Aid?
Most people have uneven hearing loss. Your eyesight is probably slightly different in each eye, your feet aren’t exactly the same size, and your hearing loss affects your ears differently. You often favor either your left or right ear, and have better hearing on one side. However, just because you have slightly better hearing in one ear doesn’t mean that ear is hearing clearly. Compared to the worse ear, your good ear might not seem so bad, but during the hearing test, we’ll discover exactly what sounds you can and can’t hear in each ear, and show you that even your good ear has hearing loss. Over 90% of the time, people have hearing loss in both ears, and need to wear two hearing aids.
Brain Health
One key reason to wear two hearing aids is for your brain health. Your body needs regular exercise to stay healthy, and muscles you don’t use get weak. Your brain is the same way. Regular brain exercise will keep you mentally sharp, and reduce your chances of rapid cognitive decline, or an early onset of dementia or Alzheimer’s Disease. Helping both your ears hear clearly will mean that both your left and right auditory centers in the brain are receiving stimulation and exercise, and you’ll hear more clearly while doing the right thing for your brain.
Binaural Hearing
Another very important reason to wear two hearing aids is binaural hearing. This means hearing with both ears, and it’s crucial for localizing where sounds are coming from, as well as moving safely through your environment. Babies are quick to learn where sounds are located, and people with clear hearing don’t think twice about localization. Knowing where a sound is coming from will help you find the phone when it’s ringing, know which room your loved one is calling from, and keep you safe, helping you easily identify where emergency sirens are coming from, or hearing someone shout a warning behind you.
Binaural hearing makes speech understanding a breeze. In fact, a recent study published in the Journal of the American Academy of Audiology found that word recognition and speech understanding was significantly more accurate for those wearing two devices when compared to those who only had one hearing aid.
Better Sound Quality
If you want to have the best in sound quality, enjoy the sounds around you, and get back to listening to the music you love, two hearing aids are better than one. When you have hearing loss, you not only have trouble hearing sounds at normal volumes, but sounds seem fuzzy and unclear. Getting two hearing aids will help you hear all the overtones and undertones, giving the sounds their rich, full texture, and making it easier to understand speech in quiet and in noise. Speech understanding and clarity is far better among those who wear two hearing aids versus just one.
Turning Down the Amplification
When you have two devices, you’ll be able to hear many of the subtle sounds around you, and since you’re receiving the same sound in both ears, you’ll perceive the sound as being louder than if you hear it with only one ear. With two hearing aids you’ll be able to hear clearly without amplifying the sounds as much, or cranking up the volume. You won’t use so much power in either device because they’ll be working together and providing you with clear hearing. You can choose smaller devices with less battery requirements, and you’ll extend the life of your batteries.
My Hearing Centers
At My Hearing Centers, we’re dedicated to giving you the best in sound and user satisfaction, and we can say with confidence that two hearing aids are better than one. Ready to find the devices that will help you hear? Visit us today for a consultation and start your journey to clear hearing.