Gary Barg: Why is it so important not to ignore hearing loss?
Ray Harris: That’s a great question. There are several reasons not to ignore hearing loss. First, it’s extremely frustrating not just for the person with hearing loss, but also their caregivers, their family and their loved ones. And second, it’s physically exhausting trying to follow along with conversations and often the person with hearing loss starts to withdraw from social settings and become isolated. Studies by John’s Hopkins University show that you’re about twice as likely to develop depression and anywhere from two to five times more likely to develop dementia if you leave your hearing loss untreated so there are many different reasons not to ignore hearing loss.
Gary Barg: Many people also put up with hearing loss because they think they can’t afford hearing aids. And are not aware of any affordable alternatives. What are these alternatives, and how much would they cost?
Ray Harris: There’s really a whole world of affordable alternatives to hearing aids out there and they can cost anywhere from $50 to maybe $200, depending on the category that you’re looking at. Take amplified phones for example. We have some excellent ones from Panasonic. They have volume and tone control and can help you hear the person on the other line better. We’ve got TV listening systems that can help you hear your favorite TV shows and movies without having to blast the volume and disturb other people in the room. We’ve got personal amplifiers that can help you hear better in one-on-one or small group settings. We even have products like alarm clocks that can vibrate your bed or flash lights to wake you up in the morning so that you don’t sleep through your alarm.
Gary Barg: From what I understand, the amplified phones you mentioned also slow down speech making it easier to understand fast talkers. And even have photo speed dialers, so if you have a loved one who may not remember phone numbers, all they need to do is remember the picture of their loved one. I think this helps keep your loved one from becoming isolated.
Ray Harris: You’re absolutely right. I would say that communicating over the phone with loved ones is one of the biggest complaints that we hear from caregivers. I do want to touch on one more category, called captioned phones. They can amplify the phone as well as allow you to adjust the tone. They have a built-in screen that displays readouts of everything the other caller is saying and that captioning service costs nothing to the user for life, since they are fully funded by the FCC.
Gary Barg: A caregiver at one of our Fearless Caregiver Conferences was talking about this and said she would come home after work before she had the phone and ask her mom living with memory loss, if the doctor called. The mother would always say no. Once she got the captioned phone, she could read the conversation between her mom and the doctor from that morning. So there’s a lot of great uses for them.
Ray Harris: Definitely. I got one for my grandpa a few years ago. My grandma used to be the one that we would always talk to on the phone. So, when she passed away, we were worried about whether we’d be able to communicate with him moving forward. The first thing we did is we got him a captioned phone. There wasn’t a dry eye in the room the first time that we called him.
Gary Barg: I’ve been reading a lot about some upcoming legislation regarding hearing aids and if this over-the-counter legislation is passed, how will it benefit those with hearing loss and their caregivers?
Ray Harris: This is exciting stuff. The over-the-counter hearing aid legislation will open the floodgates to competition in the hearing aid space. The end results will be better and more affordable choices as well as greater access to hearing aids. It will not change the importance of seeing a hearing health professional, however, especially if you have a more moderate to severe or even profound hearing loss because the legislation is meant to address hearing aids that are appropriate for the mild to moderate hearing loss category.
Gary Barg: We always tell people that the audiologist is the most important, but most underutilized medical professional that you can have as a family caregiver.
Ray Harris
Ray Harris: I completely agree with you. The importance of seeing an audiologist or other hearing professional really can’t be overstated.
Gary Barg: Do any of your phone pair up with cell phones?
Ray Harris: We have a handful of phones that can pair with your cell phone via Bluetooth.. This allows you to combine the benefits of amplification and tone control that you get from an amplified phone while still allowing you to use your cell phone number and minutes and take phone calls through your cell phone number. The Panasonic KX-TGM430B is our bestselling phone that offers that feature.
Gary Barg: There are three words that I think are the most important words for any caregiver and mostly long-distance caregivers and that is peace of mind. Do you have other products that you would recommend people looking at to help us get that much elusive piece of mind?
Ray Harris: Studies show that people with hearing loss are at much higher risk of not hearing their fire alarm go off, especially when they’re sleeping. We have products that can flash lights, vibrate your bed, and emit a low frequency alarm sound so that when the smoke alarm or carbon monoxide alarm goes off, you’re alerted to it. The combination of all those alerting types is proving to be far more effective in waking you during an emergency. So that’s one thing that we do to offer peace of mind.
Gary Barg: What would you tell family caregivers just starting out on their caregiving journey about finding trusted partners?
Ray Harris: The first thing I would say is, do not let your loved ones ignore their hearing loss and the impact that it has on their social well-being and overall health because there are extremely affordable solutions that can help them. I can’t say enough about our awesome customer service team, many of whom have hearing loss themselves and care very deeply about the issue and none of them are paid on commissions. We don’t manufacture any of the products we sell, so we can truly offer completely unfiltered, unbiased, honest advice and opinions. So, we’re a pretty good resource for that, but also definitely make an appointment with a local audiologist or hearing aid dispenser. Those are other great resources for any family caregiver.
Gary Barg: And it’s not just, per se, hearing loss. A lot of people are dealing with tinnitus, as well.
Ray Harris: Unfortunately, there’s no cure for tinnitus but we do have an array of tinnitus maskers. Those are basically sound machines that produce white noise. There’s some that make gray and brown noise, which are just different frequencies or types of white noise, as well as calming sounds like birds chirping and ocean waves that help mask out your tinnitus so that it’s less noticeable and that usually helps people sleep better. We even have portable models you can take with you when you’re traveling.
Gary Barg: Ray, if you only had one piece of advice to share with a family caregiver, what would that most important piece of advice be?
Ray Harris: Do not let your loved one’s ignore their hearing loss and the impact it has on their social well-being and overall health. There are extremely affordable solutions that can help them.