Blog

Featured Posts

a hearing aid fitting appointment with a audiologist showing the patient how to put in his hearing aid

What Happens During a Hearing Aid Fitting and Follow Up

Choosing hearing aids can feel like the biggest step in improving your hearing. Once you’ve selected the devices, you may expect to put them on, turn them on and head home. Hearing aids need more preparation than that. They have to be programmed for your hearing, checked while you’re wearing them and adjusted so they feel comfortable. A hearing aid fitting is the appointment where those pieces come together. Your audiologist sets up the devices, verifies how they’re performing and teaches you how to use them. You’ll then try them during your regular activities and return for follow up care based

The Ontario Infant Hearing Program: A Parent’s Guide to Newborn Hearing Screening

Photo by Jonathan Borba on Unsplash Few things matter more to new parents than knowing their baby is healthy. Among the screening tests offered shortly after birth, the newborn hearing screening is one of the most important yet often overlooked. Hearing plays a critical role in a child’s early development, supporting speech and language acquisition, communication, learning, and social interaction. Identifying any hearing differences as early as possible gives families and healthcare professionals the best opportunity to provide timely support. Ontario has had a universal newborn hearing screening program in place since the early 2000s, delivered through the Infant Hearing Program

What Your Audiologist Needs to Know About Your Health and Daily Life

A hearing test is an important part of understanding your hearing, but it doesn’t tell your audiologist everything. Your health, daily routine, listening environments, and personal goals can all influence the type of hearing care that may work best for you. Knowing what to tell your audiologist helps them see the full picture. A recent health change, a new challenge at work, or difficulty following conversations in restaurants may seem unrelated to your appointment, but these details can provide useful context. The more specific you can be, the easier it is to build a hearing care plan around your real life.

A man holding his ear, showing signs of Tinnitus pain

Understanding Tinnitus And Why It Happens

Tinnitus is often described as ringing in the ears, but it can sound different from person to person. Some people hear buzzing, humming, hissing, clicking, or even a whooshing sound, even when there is no outside noise causing it. For some, it comes and goes. For others, it can become a constant background sound. Tinnitus is also more common than many people realize. More than 40% of Canadians will experience tinnitus at some point in their lives, and for some, it can become bothersome enough to affect sleep, concentration, mood, and daily comfort. Understanding tinnitus means looking at what it is,

Elderly woman with short white hair, wearing a light blue jacket, leans forward with a hand to her ear, struggling with hearing loss.

How Do You Know If You Have Hearing Loss

Have you started asking people to repeat themselves more often? Maybe conversations in busy restaurants feel harder to follow, or you’ve noticed the television volume creeping higher than everyone else prefers. Hearing loss often develops gradually, which can make the early signs easy to dismiss. What feels like occasional mishearing or background noise frustration may actually be the beginning of a change in your hearing. Because hearing loss can happen slowly, many people do not realize how much they have been missing until someone else points it out. Recognizing the signs early can help you take action sooner, making it easier

Other

COOL, CALM, AND CONNECTED

As increasing numbers of people have come to view hearing aids as a technology extension of the smartphone, their coolness factor towards hearing aids has also risen. No longer are they regarded simply as a means of improving hearing health. Hearing instruments with Bluetooth connectivity have attained a new status as communication and information-gathering devices. Although they were once only compatible with Apple’s iOS mobile operating systems, newer Bluetooth hearing instruments offer universal connectivity. This makes them usable with an Android device or even a classic flip phone that is Bluetooth-ready. The latest Bluetooth hearing instruments can answer a phone call

STOP THE RINGING

“Tinnitus,” the perception of sound in the head when there is no outside sound source, is a symptom. Causes of tinnitus can include exposure to loud noises, stress, injury, Meniere’s disease, hypertension, migraine headaches, drinking too much coffee, and even over-accumulations of earwax. “Ringing in the ears,” as it is more commonly known, may also be a symptom of hearing loss. It is interesting to note that, as tiny sensory “hair cells” in the inner ear are lost or damaged, the pitch of the tinnitus often coincides with the area that also has the most hearing loss. Don’t worry! There is

ROCK TAKES ITS TOLL

As a Baby Boomer, attending your share of rock concerts may have caused you to have the same problem as many of your musical heroes. Pete Townshend, Eric Clapton, and Neil Young have all professed to have hearing loss. One symptom you should be on the lookout for is difficulty hearing your partner’s side of the conversation in a noisy restaurant. This hearing problem is usually symptomatic of “presbycusis,” or age-related hearing loss, caused by the death of hair cells in the inner ear. These cells are important because they translate sound vibrations into brain signals. Once they’re damaged – usually

TRANSMITTING SOUND THROUGH BONE

Conductive hearing loss occurs when sounds are not conducted efficiently through the outer ear canal to the eardrum and the tiny bones, called ossicles, of the middle ear. Patients who experience conductive hearing loss primarily use bone anchored hearing instruments to assist them in hearing better. This is also the choice for those who have unsatisfactorily tried using a powerful air conduction hearing instrument or a bone conduction instrument held in place with headbands. As the name implies, bone-anchored hearing instruments are actually fixed to the wearer’s skull. The microphone and sound processor capture and transmit sound vibrations to the titanium

Blog

Featured Posts

Other

Book Your Hearing Health Check Appointment