My mum has finally agreed to look into getting a hearing aid - any advice / tips?

[scrambledhead]

Her hearing has been poor for as long as I can remember - at least 30 years. I hope she hasn't left it too late.

I really hope that they can do something to help. Whoever "they" are...

Anyone got any experience of NHS -v- going Private?

Thanks

no advice - just admiration. How did you do it??? My mum's health severly compromised by her deafness - i am going to beat her to death with her walking stick if she doesn't do something about it soon.

My mum was the same, she was deaf in one ear since her 30s. She finally got a hearing aid about a year ago. There is a very long waiting list on the NHS for hearing aids, I think it was nearly a year before she finally got it.

Missingtheaction - I don't know really. Maybe she's just ready. Maybe she's finally realised how much she's missing. She's been through so much the past few years, I thought it would never happen. Good luck with your mum.

She said she's prepared to go private but the place she went to are saying £2,000. I just don't want her getting ripped off.

The waiting lists for hearing-aids are much shorter since they brought in the new government guidelines. When they first brought in the digital aids there was a waiting time of something like 18mths. When I got mine last year this had been reduced to something like 3 or 4 months.

I don't have experience of going private but have found the NHS ones to be really good. The audiologist programmes them for you to your own individual needs and so they're about 1000 times better than the old analogue ones. Replacement batteries and tubing are also free.

Thanks Coppertop. That's helpful. Nice to hear a positive NHS story.

I have two hearing aids. I went privately. I got one first for the ear with the worse hearing. It took about 6 months to get used to it. Getting the second one helped too.

I found that my relationships have changed quite a bit. I no longer tolerate not understanding what is being said. I like to check what a person means if I miss a word. My children's speech has become much more clear since I have been stopping them as soon as they have lost me. I used to let them go on and on because there was no other option.

Best wishes to your mother.

Make sure the batteries aren't too tiny!!

I used to work for a hearing aid company and the NHS don't have the full range of aids available so if you think it might be a struggle to persuade your mother to get one when she starts being fitted for them, you might find going private helps with the choice etc. Well done for managing to get her to try one out - my MIL refuses point blank!

Yes well done but your job isn't finished yet. Eventually persuaded DF to get 1 then half the time he switched it off to get some peace and quiet and then 1 memorable Xmas he took the batteries out and we didn't find out until afterwards when we were all hoarse and irritated - he had a lovely quiet time though .

ps agree with milou2 about the batteries....

I've had NHS aids for 20 years, and been prodding my MIL to use aids for 12...

The only reasons to go private are to get the tinier more 'discreet' aids, and less waiting time. However, no-one ever notices hearing aids anyway (seriously. mine have magenta earmoulds, shiny metal rings on the tubing, and black aids behind the ear, and people still don't notice!), so I'd advise against tiny in-the-canal aids because they're bloody fiddly.

Your mum needs a referal to Audiology for a proper hearing test - either via GP or try phoning your local hospital's audiology unit and seeing what they say (they may also say that hospital X down the road has shorter waiting times!). Your mum probably has standard age-related hearing loss, which means they have lots of suitable aids on the NHS, and they're pretty easy to program in one appointment.

So I'd start with the NHS - everything coppertop says has been true for me, although I've got a complex loss (head audiologist looks at tearful student plotting my hearing and goes 'what the f* is that?', looks up and sees me in the testing booth and says 'Oh, it's you again'! - cue three audios spending 3 hours tweaking my aids!)

However, aids aren't a magical solution, especially if your mum has spent 30 years not being used to hearing lots of things. You need to retrain your ears to ignore certain noises and get used to understanding other ones. And to changing program when there's lots of background noise, so they only pick up what's in front of you. My MIL will now wear one aid to use the phone and watch TV, but the rest of the time it's a case of training her to ask for repeats and FIL to get her attention before speaking and state the subject of the conversation up front.