Many caregivers are caring for loved ones who
have developed hearing loss over the years. Seniors
often have trouble understanding others speaking to
them over the telephone. Increasingly, they
“pretend” to understand what is being said, ask the
person to “speak up” or request the information be
repeated over and over. They can find it
increasingly difficult to understand instructions or
directions, recognize confirmation numbers for
products or services, and most important,
communicate with emergency operators when necessary.
Today, new more accessible telephone products and
services, including hearing aid compatible phones,
are becoming more widely available. In the last 20
years, a wide range of voice, text, and video relay
services and technologies have been developed that
enable consumer choice of language and mode of
communication to access the telephone network.
Captioned telephone technology is one of these
new technologies that are assisting people who have
retained some of their hearing to listen to the
actual voice of the person on the telephone while
reading the text of the conversation they are
having.
How Captioned Telephones Work
Captioned telephones are is similar to captioned
television, where spoken words appear as written
text for viewers to read. The captioned telephone
looks and works like any traditional phone, with
callers talking and listening to each other, but
with one significant difference: written captions
are quickly delivered for every phone call. The
captions are displayed on the phone’s built-in
screen so the user can read the words while
listening to the voice of the other party. If the
captioned telephone user has difficulty hearing what
the caller says or understanding the words, he or
she can read the captions for clarification.
Captioned telephone phone users place a call in
the same way as dialing a traditional phone. As they
dial, the captioned telephone automatically connects
to a captioning service. When the other party
answers, the captioned telephone user hears
everything that they say, just like a traditional
call.
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