It probably feels like a simple thing to care for your hearing aids. After all, you were most likely given a set of care instructions when you originally bought your devices. With regard to routine hearing aid maintenance, the majority of hearing specialists will give you a step-by-step instruction tutorial. Still, getting that much information at once means you most likely didn’t remember some of it. So you still might be wondering, what should my cleaning routine look like? What about my service schedule? How can I make my hearing aids last as long as possible?
These five, easy-to-follow tips can help provide some answers, as well as easy ways to help in taking care of your hearing aids so they function better longer.
Tip #1: Keep your hearing aids dry
Electronics typically don’t like wetness. Although your hearing aids might offer a certain level of water resistance, you typically want to keep moisture away from them. Beyond the obvious, this means you should do things like the following:
- When you have your hearing aids in your ears, avoid using hair care products. That is, take your hearing aids out before using a lot of hair spray or hair gel. Your hearing aid can really get gunked up from these types of products.
- Store your hearing aids somewhere dry and cool. Many people question what the best way to store hearing aids is. So the steamy bathroom isn’t going to be a very good place to store your hearing aids. And in order to keep track of your hearing aids, store them in the same spot every day. In the same way, don’t leave your hearing aids just lying around, dogs like to eat them and cats like to play with them!
- When it’s humid outdoors, run a dehumidifier. When it’s very humid, your hearing aids can have more moisture than you would want even indoors. And that moisture can compromise the delicate electronics inside. Prolonging hearing aid life might mean keeping that dehumidifier running.
Tip #2: Keep the earwax filters nice and clean
Earwax production is a healthy and normal thing for the human body to do. It’s also something that hearing aid manufacturers know is going to occur. As a result, most hearing aids are designed to deal with a modest amount of earwax.
It’s up to you to be sure there’s not too much earwax on your hearing aids. This means examining and replacing the wax guards when necessary (and making that an element of your hearing aid cleaning program). Depending on what model hearing aid you have, you can invest in specialized little tools for this and we can help you with that.
How often should wax guards be replaced? Well, for most models, it will be around once every month or so.
Tip #3: Keep your batteries charged and fresh
Your Hearing aids rely on your batteries for power. Your hearing aid will last much longer if you keep your batteries fresh. So there are several battery-care steps you can take:
- Invest in a rechargeable device or a battery charger: That way, you won’t be throwing batteries (and money) away over and over again.
- Be sure all of the battery contacts and components are dry. You can wipe them with a clean cloth if they aren’t. As with most electronics, moisture will lead to a bad time here.
- Don’t forget to shut off your hearing aids when you aren’t using them. This just kills the battery for, well, no good reason. And that means your hearing aids could stop working when you least want them to.
Tip #4: Only use clean hands to handle your hearing aids
Most of the time, you should be wearing your hearing aids. But they depend on you to put them in. You use your hands to put in your hearing aids, and those fingers could contain all sorts of things (salt, maple syrup, Cheeto dust, and so on). By design, hearing aids are really delicate and likely won’t do well with things like crumbs.
In general, you should only handle your hearing aids with clean hands. So give your hands a quick clean before you need to take them out and handle them.
Tip #5 Keep us in the loop
It may feel like, once you have your hearing aids, you can leave your hearing specialist in the dust. Typically, though, this is not the case. Most individuals who have hearing loss will want to set up routine appointments with us for the following reasons:
- To help make sure your devices fit well.
- To clean and maintain your hearing aids.
- Check the status of your hearing loss (making sure it isn’t progressing faster than expected).
When something breaks, what should you do?
Sometimes, despite your best efforts, something goes wrong with your hearing aids (perhaps you accidentally step on them). You should contact us as soon as possible in situations like this.
If your device requires any repairs, or you need a new one, we can help with that.
Make an appointment with us today to talk about your current or next set of hearing aids.