Do you need hearing loss help? Did you maybe listen to the Rolling Stones at top volume too much?

Hearing loss is gradual, and often the damage shows up many years later.

This means that many fifty plus people are starting to notice hearing loss symptoms like these:

• Missing words in a sentence certain words or find yourself confusing words or misunderstanding conversations.
• Starting to avoid parties, movies or going to restaurants with groups.
• Trouble hearing the television properly without turning the volume up higher than people around you would
• Noticing that you don’t hear the birds as well as you used to

Or we can decide to figure out whether we need to start looking for hearing loss help to make sure we enjoy the audio world fully as we age. .

Many of us will start by looking online to see if there is a hearing test we can take in the privacy of our own homes. Searching for “hearing loss” will turn up websites that let us test our hearing in different ways.

www.oticon.ca asks you a series of questions that let you decide if you are starting to need hearing loss help.

www.phonak.com lets you listen to versions of normal hearing, mild hearing loss and moderate to severe hearing loss.

And there are plenty of others online.

But let’s face it. If you’re searching for a hearing test online, you probably have a pretty strong suspicion that you have some hearing loss.

Luckily there are many local hearing aid clinics that can provide professional hearing assessment.

If you do need a hearing aid, you’ll probably be offered one of three types a hearing aid that sits behind the ear, one that sits in the ear, or one that sits in the ear canal.

The problem with that last choice is that we usually associate hearing loss with aging, and we don’t want to admit that we are “that old”. It’s easier to say you’re busy and can’t come to a party than to say that you can’t hear too well at parties any more.

Here’s another way to look at it.

Hearing aids go trendy
With so many boomers getting older, hearing aids will go mainstream soon. They’ll be like eyeglasses and contact lenses – not necessarily a sign of aging so much as a tool to get the most out of the world around us.

In the words of one hearing aid company, hearing aids are just tools that let you “get the most out of your hearing”.

And they’re being promoted as trendy hi-tech accessories like headphones.

Look at what Oticon says on its website about its Delta hearing aid

“Finally, a hearing device that people want to wearDelta is both discreet and elegant. With its smooth triangular lines and vibrant colours it becomes a hi-tech communication accessory. With Delta you can hear better AND be a trendsetter!”

We’ll benefit from all the hearing loss research that’s going on
Hearing aid companies are going full tilt to improve the design and function of hearing aids. They know that millions of boomers are their next wave of potential customers. They’re looking for ways to improve sound transmission and reduce any annoying side effects such as too much background noise.

So we can look forward to improvements in hearing testing, and hearing aids. And that means we can look forward to more years of driving safely, watching TV at normal volumes, and going to parties.

But we’ll probably need to cool it on listening to the Rolling Stones at high volumes over headsets.