What Are the Benefits of Analog Hearing Aids?

Analog hearing aids are not a thing of the past; they're still being manufactured. As advanced-feature digital technology is incorporated into hearing aids, improvements are also taking place in analog hearing-aid circuitry. There are still many hearing-impaired people who choose analog hearing aids over digital.

Significance

• "Analog" refers to the circuit of a hearing aid and how the sound is internally processed prior to amplification. People hear in analog. Sound that’s digitally processed and adjusted must be converted back to an analog signal for the human ear to hear it.

Effects

• Analog hearing aids produce a louder, stronger signal. An analog hearing aid will stop amplifying if a sound is loud enough and amplifies soft or distant sounds more than a digital hearing aid. This makes analog hearing aids ideal for people with profound hearing loss and deafness.

Benefits

• When most of your hearing is gone, you want to be able to hear as much as possible. Analog hearing aids give you a greater awareness of surrounding sounds and a greater sense of hearing.

Potential

• Analog hearing aids provide clearer hearing in quiet situations. When watching television, having one-on-one conversations or enjoying quiet activities, analog hearing aids provide better hearing. Digital hearing aids turn down when the environment is quiet, can distort television, and block surrounding sounds.

Expert Insight

• During loud concerts, plays, musicals or events, digital hearing aids compress and muffle sound. Analog hearing aids amplify sound without compression so that music sounds clearer.

Fun Fact

• Most digital hearing aids have a music program or memory designed to provide you better sound quality when listening to music. If you choose "Music Mode" on your hearing aid, all the digital features are shut off, making it basically an analog hearing aid.