How to Choose a Discount Hearing Aid
When you go to consult your 'ENT' (Ear, Nose and Throat) doctor, your otolaryngologist or your audiologist, it is best to have some personal knowledge of hearing aids and the kind of hearing aid you would like and can afford.
If you do not have this information, you may come away from the doctor's surgery thinking that you have been rail-roaded into making a quick decision and purchasing an item that you would rather not have.
It is far better to go in with some information on hearing aids, then to listen to what the doctor has to tell you and then to do some more research on that additional information.
Many doctors' surgeries will offer you a selection of excellent deaf aids, but they are seldom bargain basement priced.
You usually have to pay the full recommended retail price, which does not make sense, because everything is on sale somewhere nowadays.
The problem that you will face, if you attempt to get a discounted model is how to circumvent forgeries and seconds.
Therefore, it is imperative to check the item that you are buying against the specifications of an authentic article.
If you get this right, you could save between 25% and 50% on the MRRP (manufacturer's recommended retail price).
In order to make sure that you have the genuine item, take away literature on the doctor's proposed hearing aids from the doctor's office.
Get as much data on two or three hearing aids as you can together with the doctor's prices.
Now you can go for a walk through town and surf the Internet searching for the precise same devices at cut-rate prices.
Be suspicious of look-a-likes and forgeries.
I once saw dozens of people buying greatly discounted Nokia 97 mobile phones.
Not many people noticed that it said: Nokla 97 on the phones' casing and of course, most of the functions of the original did not work.
Examining the country of origin can be a sure sign, although most things seem to be manufactured in China these days.
If the doctor's advice was for a digital device, be sure not to be fooled by phrases such as 'programmable analogue' or even 'programmable digital', because they are not fully digital, even though they are more effective than purely analogue hearing aids.
A strictly digital apparatus will have channels so that your audiologist can fine tune the instrument to your particular hearing problems.
Make sure that the device you are looking at has the same number of channels as your doctor's.
Check that the two devices are worn in precisely the same mode, because a lot of manufacturers will make quite a few models of hearing aid, so an HA991 could easily be mixed up with an inferior HA990, for example.
Check the data for both devices carefully especially with regard to the aid's sensitivity, directional microphones and sound reproduction capabilities.
Do both models have the same number of presets? And do they both have a memory for your preferred settings? These presets are not necessarily essential, but once you have used them, you will soon find them extremely convenient.
This is a lot of information to bear in mind, but it is the only safe way if you want to learn how to choose a discount hearing aid shrewdly.
If you do not have this information, you may come away from the doctor's surgery thinking that you have been rail-roaded into making a quick decision and purchasing an item that you would rather not have.
It is far better to go in with some information on hearing aids, then to listen to what the doctor has to tell you and then to do some more research on that additional information.
Many doctors' surgeries will offer you a selection of excellent deaf aids, but they are seldom bargain basement priced.
You usually have to pay the full recommended retail price, which does not make sense, because everything is on sale somewhere nowadays.
The problem that you will face, if you attempt to get a discounted model is how to circumvent forgeries and seconds.
Therefore, it is imperative to check the item that you are buying against the specifications of an authentic article.
If you get this right, you could save between 25% and 50% on the MRRP (manufacturer's recommended retail price).
In order to make sure that you have the genuine item, take away literature on the doctor's proposed hearing aids from the doctor's office.
Get as much data on two or three hearing aids as you can together with the doctor's prices.
Now you can go for a walk through town and surf the Internet searching for the precise same devices at cut-rate prices.
Be suspicious of look-a-likes and forgeries.
I once saw dozens of people buying greatly discounted Nokia 97 mobile phones.
Not many people noticed that it said: Nokla 97 on the phones' casing and of course, most of the functions of the original did not work.
Examining the country of origin can be a sure sign, although most things seem to be manufactured in China these days.
If the doctor's advice was for a digital device, be sure not to be fooled by phrases such as 'programmable analogue' or even 'programmable digital', because they are not fully digital, even though they are more effective than purely analogue hearing aids.
A strictly digital apparatus will have channels so that your audiologist can fine tune the instrument to your particular hearing problems.
Make sure that the device you are looking at has the same number of channels as your doctor's.
Check that the two devices are worn in precisely the same mode, because a lot of manufacturers will make quite a few models of hearing aid, so an HA991 could easily be mixed up with an inferior HA990, for example.
Check the data for both devices carefully especially with regard to the aid's sensitivity, directional microphones and sound reproduction capabilities.
Do both models have the same number of presets? And do they both have a memory for your preferred settings? These presets are not necessarily essential, but once you have used them, you will soon find them extremely convenient.
This is a lot of information to bear in mind, but it is the only safe way if you want to learn how to choose a discount hearing aid shrewdly.
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