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The FDA wants you to be able to buy a hearing aid without a prescription

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Re: The FDA wants you to be able to buy a hearing aid without a prescription

#23
post #5

Some feature requests for hearing aid: Can we get hearing aids that are bigger? These small hearing aids make it easier to lose, and I do not mind looking "disabled" to people. Also would like to use bluetooth to both locate the hearing aids, and to connect to devices as needed. Would be cool if the battery can be recharged as needed, maybe through usb-c if possible, but magnetic charging would be acceptable.

Two questions if you don't mind:

Do you charge one ear at a time so you are never without some level of hearing?

Can you comment on the Live Listen feature of AirPods?

Re: The FDA wants you to be able to buy a hearing aid without a prescription

#24
Middlemen and gatekeepers are all over our medical industry. When I travel I am always surprised at how much easier it is to get drugs outside the US. Many prescription drugs here are over the counter elsewhere and much cheaper. I hope we start removing prescription gatekeeping more broadly, so I can stop paying hundreds for performative office visits that offer no value. It’s also a big time sink just to get some mundane antibiotic or skincare cream or whatever, when all that happens is that an FNP runs through the most basic Q&A script that can be self discovered online.

Re: The FDA wants you to be able to buy a hearing aid without a prescription

#25
post #18
post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

An improperly tuned hearing aid can make your hearing worse though...actively causing further damage.

Right, but I can also buy an improperly tuned chainsaw and cut my arm off. I’d argue that there should be a giant warning on the box about proper tuning, and leave it at that.

Reading glasses can be exchanged or refunded at most stores if they are not suitable. I would hope the FDA specifies the same for OTC hearing aids.

Re: The FDA wants you to be able to buy a hearing aid without a prescription

#26

Contact lenses next? It's amazingly stupid that I, as a tourist, who knows exactly what types of contacts I need, may need to get a US prescription for contacts.

Is this really a problem in practice? I've always had a valid prescription when I buy glasses, but at the glasses store I just flash them the prescription on my phone for a few seconds. It's a PDF on official looking letterhead, but I don't think there's any verification. I suppose it's probably not the best idea to fake an eyeglass prescription, but it certainly seems like it would be very easy to do.

Re: The FDA wants you to be able to buy a hearing aid without a prescription

#27

Contact lenses next? It's amazingly stupid that I, as a tourist, who knows exactly what types of contacts I need, may need to get a US prescription for contacts.

I ordered an optometry kit from Amazon as my prescription changes by the hour most days.

Was very interesting to play around and helped me isolate the 2 prescriptions that my eyes drift back and forth from.

Something that eye doctors had given up on trying to help me.

Re: The FDA wants you to be able to buy a hearing aid without a prescription

#28

What about building one's own hearing aid? This DIY project came to mind: https://hackaday.com/2013/12/15/diy-hearing-aid/ No mention of DIY hearing aids from the FDA.

Because there aren't any FDA regulations preventing you from building a DIY hearing aid?

Re: The FDA wants you to be able to buy a hearing aid without a prescription

#29
post #15

BUT WHAT IF PEOPLE ABUSE HEARING AID?????? To be serious: amount of things that are "prescription only", even if they can cause only minimal harm, is astounding.

What if they do end up with a better hearing though? Think about the consequences..

Or what if the ENTs haven't lobbied lately but instead the device makers did this time?

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