Do you recognize this? You will soon have an important appointment or you just want to go with your best friend to that nice cabaret show that you have been looking forward to for a long time, your hearing aid is not working! Very annoying, of course, because you don’t want to miss any important information and especially the punch line of the jokes, which makes you feel insecure and not enjoy the performance as much as you would like.
Even the very best hearing aid can sometimes cause problems. Most are often easy to solve and often you do not even have to visit the hearing care professional. That saves a lot of time and hassle. So don’t panic because with the checklist below, the problem can often be solved yourself so that you can go to that important appointment with confidence and fully enjoy your outing with a friend.
Checklist:
- Is the battery still good?
- Are the battery contacts clean?
- Is the battery sufficiently charged?
- Is the battery door properly closed?
- Is the microphone filter clogged?
- Is there moisture in the hose or earhook?
- Is the earmold clogged by cerumen?
- Is the thin tube clogged with cerumen?
- Has the hearing aid become damp?
Below is an explanation for all the above points:
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1. There are battery testers with which you can test the capacity of the battery. Some batteries lose their power when they reach the end of their use-by date. But of course there can also be a “Monday morning” battery pack included. That’s just bad luck!
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2. Because your hearing aid is still on your skin, dirt can get into the battery drawer and contaminate the contacts. You can then carefully clean the contact points with a cotton swab and some alcohol (70%), available at the drugstore. Maybe the battery has been accidentally put in upside down? Then the contact points could be bent a bit further apart so that it no longer “grabs” the battery properly.
- 3. With the rechargeable hearing aids, it sometimes happens that the plug is removed from the socket when they are fully charged. Don’t do this! The hearing aids cannot “overcharge” and completely deflating is also not good for them. The charger consumes very little power. What we also sometimes see is that something has fallen into the charger that covers the contact points, even then it will not charge properly.
- 4. With new hearing aids, the battery drawer is often a bit stiff. Do not be afraid to push hard, it must not break.
- 5. One of the most common problems with hearing aids with a speaker in the ear over which a rubber cap (dome) or a custom acrylic shell is built around it is that the filter has become clogged. . No sound can then be passed on to your ear. Replacing this filter with a new one often resolves the problem. It also helps to brush the filter clean with a special brush or, if you don’t have one, with a dry toothbrush before putting it in in the morning. Cerumen is often a bit dried up and easy to remove.
- 6. If you have a hearing aid with a plastic bend that is connected to a plastic tube on the earmold, the tube will need to be replaced after a while. This hardens so that it is no longer flexible. The earmould also needs to be placed in a bubble bath from time to time. If you then rinse your earmold and blow it dry, it can still happen that a drop of moisture has remained in the tube or ear piece. As a result, the sound is blocked and your hearing aid no longer works. Your last resort is to blow dry! Very occasionally people also put the plastic bend in the bath. That is not the intention, but if it still happens, blowing dry is the only solution. Special cleaning sets are available on the website.
- 7. Of course, the earpiece should also be cleaned here, see above.
- 8. Hearing aids that do not have a speaker in the ear but are connected to a thin tube with a rubber cap or a custom-made shell can also become blocked by earwax. You then carefully unscrew the tube from your hearing aid and push a thin blade through it (from the side where you removed it from your hearing aid).
- 9. Did your hearing aid get wet because you had a heavy rain shower on your head? Your hearing aids are designed to withstand this type of weather. If you still think this is the cause, remove the battery and dry it in your drying box. Preferably two sessions in a row, often they will do it again.
Have you gone through all the checklist points and your hearing aid is still not working? Often your hearing care professional can assess the problem over the phone and help you further. Of course, if you prefer to make an appointment, that's possible too.