What hearing aids are good for children?

I think that in daily life, parents also feel that choosing hearing aids for their babies is a difficult problem. When choosing hearing aids, they often communicate with doctors and make decisions based on the child's condition. If a child has hearing loss, they should seek timely treatment and wear hearing aids. So what kind of hearing aids are good for children?

What factors should be considered in the successful selection of children's hearing aids?

1. Child’s age: The child’s age needs to be subdivided into under 6 months, 6 months to 1 year old, 1 to 2 years old, 2 to 4 years old, etc. The younger the age, the finer the division. Even if the hearing loss is the same, the fitting parameters for different ages are different. Even for the same child, the same hearing aid, and the same hearing loss, the hearing aid adjustment parameters for different age groups are different.

2. Children's hearing loss: For infants and young children under 3 years old, accurate judgment of the degree of hearing loss is very important for the selection and adjustment of hearing aids for children! Children of this age group will not cooperate subjectively. When determining the degree of hearing loss at each frequency, it is necessary to comprehensively analyze various objective hearing reports and conduct behavioral audiometry. In fact, for children over 6 months old, different methods of behavioral audiometry can be selected according to the characteristics of the child. The degree of hearing loss of the child can be measured through the experience, patience and careful observation of the tester.

3. Inquiry into medical history: Communication between hearing aid fitters and parents is very important. Through the professional knowledge of the fitter, the fitter can selectively communicate with parents to understand the child’s medical history and reaction to sounds in daily life. Combined with the child’s age characteristics and hearing test reports, a comprehensive judgment can be made on the child’s hearing development status, so as to choose a suitable hearing aid.

4. Does the hearing aid fitter have a medical background? Different from hearing aid fitting for adults, hearing aid fitting for children requires that the hearing aid fitter should have a formal medical education background. This way, the doctor's professional knowledge can be used to conduct professional hearing aid fitting and follow-up for the child.

5. Active cooperation from parents: Hearing aids are an important tool for children's auditory and speech rehabilitation and learning. Therefore, hearing aid fitting is a long process, not just buying a hearing aid. Parents' active cooperation and participation in subsequent follow-up visits is very important for children to always maintain the best hearing condition!

6. Hearing aid brand and corresponding performance and parameters: It is also important for the hearing aid fitter to choose the appropriate hearing aid based on the child’s current hearing and the expected hearing needs in the next 6 years or so. The most expensive is not necessarily the best! The most suitable one is the best.

7. Hearing aid brand and price: There is not much difference in technology among the top international brands of hearing aids. What parents need to consider is whether the technology of the hearing aid can meet the hearing and speech rehabilitation needs of their children for about 8 years, whether the quality of the hearing aid is stable, and whether the hearing aid is cost-effective. There are many brands of hearing aids at present, and the prices vary. The prices of hearing aids from Phonak, Siemens, Unitron, Starkey, Widex, ReSound, and Oticon are generally higher, while the prices of hearing aids from Acoustikon, New Sound, Ostar, and RHYTHON are relatively lower.

Parents must be cautious when choosing hearing aids for children. In fact, not all brands are good, and not all expensive ones are good. So don't blindly follow brands. When choosing, you should ask the fitter to help you choose a hearing aid that is suitable for your child. This is responsible for your child.