Can AirPods Replace Hearing Aids? OTC Hearing Aids & The Future of Hearing

Are OTC hearing aids really the same as prescription hearing aids?
If you’ve ever wondered whether buying hearing aids online is basically the same as getting fit in a clinic, this episode draws a clear line between the two.

The biggest issue is perceived hearing loss. Feeling like your hearing is “probably mild” is not the same as knowing your exact hearing loss type, severity, whether one ear is worse than the other, or whether there are medical red flags that need immediate attention.

We explain what prescription hearing aids actually mean: professionally programmed devices tailored to your personal hearing profile and designed to treat a full range of hearing loss from mild to profound.

Because hearing loss is personal, two people with the same audiogram can have completely different communication needs depending on lifestyle, work demands, social activity, listening environments, expectations, dexterity, and vision.

We also answer a common question: Why do clinic hearing aids cost more than OTC hearing aids?

Because you’re not just paying for the device...you’re paying for the process:

• Comprehensive hearing testing
 • Video otoscopy
 • Tympanometry
 • Speech testing
 • Real Ear Measurements
 • Tinnitus support
 • Follow-up care
 • Ongoing adjustments & maintenance

That’s the difference between buying a product and receiving hearing healthcare.

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Transcript

Friday Audiogram Kickoff

Blaise M. Delfino, M.S. - HIS 0:00

This is the Friday Audiogram. Let's go. I think the biggest misconception I still see today is simple. People think OTC hearing aids and prescription hearing aids are basically the same thing. They are not. Let's start with who OTC hearing aids are intended for. So OTC hearing aids are designed for adults with perceived mild to moderate hearing loss. And that word really does matter. Perceived. Perceived means that you think your hearing loss is mild to moderate, but perception is not diagnosis. I want to repeat that one more time. Perception is not diagnosis. You cannot accurately determine your type of hearing loss, degree of hearing loss, whether you present with asymmetry, any medical red flags, speech understanding deficits, cochlear function, just by guessing. That requires a comprehensive audiological evaluation conducted by a licensed hearing health care professional. Now, compare that with prescriptive hearing technology. Prescription hearing aids are programmed to an individual hearing loss. They can serve patients with mild loss, moderate loss, severe loss, and profound loss. So the bandwidth is much broader, flexibility is greater, and the precision is far, far more advanced. And that matters because hearing loss is personal. No two hearing losses are the same. Two people with the same audiogram can have different communication needs. There's different lifestyles. One may be more socially active than the other. And you, as a hearing care professional, if you're a hearing care professional tuned in, will learn what their social activity level and their lifestyle is, test their hearing, and then make that appropriate technology recommendation, not only based on their type and degree of hearing loss, but social activity as well. Patients will have different dexterity. Again, we talk about dexterity as it relates to hearing technology. So a patient who has decreased dexterity, I might and would most likely recommend a custom component to their hearing technology. So if they have really bad dexterity and they have okay vision, most likely going to recommend a full shell custom hearing aid. Patients also might have different expectations, different noise environments, which of course parallels that of what their social activity level is. And in totality, this is why customization matters. Two patients, similar audiogram, different expectations, different social activity level. This is where hearing healthcare gets really fun and pretty awesome, in my opinion, for lack of a better term, because you, as a clinician, taking the clinician's point of view, you're not only testing the patient's hearing, but you have this differential diagnosis going on of what is going to be best for this patient. Yes, what do they want? What do they need? But you as the professional, you're guiding that conversation. When I was in clinic, patients used to ask me, and this was, I would say on a weekly basis, why are your hearing aids more expensive than devices I can buy online? And I would always say that is a fair question. And I never got defensive, I never argued, never took it personally. But I really did see this as an opportunity to educate my patients because I knew that they were not comparing apples to apples. They were comparing a product to a process. Now, let me explain this a little bit. When you work with a hearing care professional, you are not just paying for the hardware. So you're not just paying for the hearing aids and the beeps and the bops and all that testing. You are paying for expertise, diagnostics, verification, outcomes, and support, which is what we refer to a lot as counseling. So it's not just the gadget. We always say that the hearing aid is only a third of the process. And this is where I believe living in this time of OTC devices, consumers being able to purchase devices online, we as hearing care professionals have the opportunity to sort of flex our best practices a little and really educate the consumer on why they need to come in to the office. And I want to use this as an opportunity to review what best practice care includes, which is video autoscopy, which allows the hearing care professional to review and see your eardrum, if there's any impaction of wax, ear infection, et cetera. Then tympanometry, which measures the middle ear function, autoacoustic emissions measures that inner ear function, pure tone audiometry, bone conduction testing, speech and noise testing, counseling, the hearing aid fitting, real ear measurements, which every hearing care professional should do, objective verification, outcome questionnaires like the abbreviated profile hearing aid benefit, if a patient presents with tinnitus or ringing in their ears, the tinnitus handicap index, follow-up fine-tuning, and then maintenance and support. That is hearing health care. What I just reviewed there is personalized care. That is not the same as opening a box. And here's the analogy I always think about. A race car is incredibly powerful. You're talking over 200 miles an hour, some of them. But if you put me behind the wheel of that race car, I'm not maximizing it. Put a professional driver behind the wheel, though, now you're gonna see what it can really do. Hearing technology is similar. Yes, the device matters, but who is steering the ship, in my opinion, matters even more.