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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

#201

Post by RHSeeger »

jrace wrote: post #128

How much would you pay for: *Hearing test * Hearing aid fitting * Usage counselling * Follow up adjustments * Annual retest of your hearing * Replacement of lost hearing aids * Unlimited repair for 3 years ?? ====== I got out of the Audiology field in 2015. At that time all the above was included for every hearing aid we sold (Prices varied from $750 / ear - $3600 / ear. When I was in that field many companies tried…

> There is far more to fixing your hearing issues that just amplifying sound. Sadly, most people wait too long before trying a hearing aid, and give up because they hear too much noise.

Of the people I know who have gotten hearing aids, every single one of them was disappointed. Every single one of them still had trouble hearing. As far as I can tell, the only thing the audiologists appear to be able to be able to correct for (with current hearing aids) is "make it louder". If more than that is needed, it's a vicious cycle of taking it home, realizing it's not really helping, and bringing it back to try a new one.

The above seems to be particularly true when the hearing problem is heavily weighed towards not being able to hear certain/higher frequencies, so can "hear" people talking, but can't understand it; especially if there's any background noise at all.

I sympathize that your job was hard and that the clients made it harder. But the clients following directions and trying multiple different hearing aids ... doesn't really solve the problem in a lot of cases. Hearing aids are very expensive, far too expensive for a result of "I still can't understand people talking to me".

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

#202

Post by WillPostForFood »

JCM9 wrote: post #55

There are a number of healthcare areas in the US that have been protected by regulation, but it’s increasingly unclear if this is good for patients, consumers, or public health at large. The increasing sentiment seems to be probably not. Vision care is another area I’d expect to see more changes and disruption coming down the pipeline. Vision care is very important and advanced cases require special skills, but it’s…

There are a number of healthcare areas in the US that have been protected by regulation

Really, isn’t it all areas?

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

#203

Post by handrous »

TedDoesntTalk wrote: post #56
jedimastert wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is that true? I've ordered all of my glasses online for the past few years, and they've never asked for anything other than a form to fill out.

I don’t buy online because I want to see how they look on my face first. Many shops won’t sell you glasses unless your prescription is under 1 year old. This allows them to charge you for an exam when you don’t necessarily need it.

Lots of Zenni frames are so cheap that it's non-crazy to just order like 3 pair you think might work, and keep the two you like the least as backups, wearing the one that looked best. They also have "see it on your face" tech that's... OK, for narrowing it down. Better than nothing, and better than looking at them on a model.

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

#204

Post by RHSeeger »

EastOfTruth wrote: post #198
dmurray wrote: post #160

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've long thought the problem with hearing aids is the calibration process. People (often old, confused, and less tech-familiar) try them on and spend half an hour answering questions about "does that sound better?" What if, instead, the calibration process worked constantly? Give the user a button to press when they don't hear something well, and another when they do. Let them have this for a month, let them try it…

> What if, instead, the calibration process worked constantly? Give the user a button to press when they don't hear something well, and another when they do. On TVs, they call those buttons volume buttons, it is revolutionary.

A lot of the time it's not absolute volume. If you can't hear certain frequency ranges well, boosting the volume of all ranges is just going to drown out the ones you can't hear well.

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

#205

Post by falcolas »

dsizzle wrote: post #79
JCM9 wrote: post #55

There are a number of healthcare areas in the US that have been protected by regulation, but it’s increasingly unclear if this is good for patients, consumers, or public health at large. The increasing sentiment seems to be probably not. Vision care is another area I’d expect to see more changes and disruption coming down the pipeline. Vision care is very important and advanced cases require special skills, but it’s…

Not sure why vision checks require a doctor at all. In the end, they're just relying on your responses anyway: "What's better: A or B"? In fact, I'd go further and say it doesn't even require another person. I, for one, am glad to see this bill.

FWIW, a checkup for me is 1 part refraction, one part retinal inspection, one part corneal inspection, and one part automated refraction/pressure checks.

Only one of those parts can be done without a doctor or highly specialized equipment.

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

#206

Post by thegrimmest »

aidenn0 wrote: post #193
jrace wrote: post #167

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It was not an argument, but a statement. If one model (pay as you go) causes harm to the whole industry (people know believe hearing aids do not work) then why would the industry continue?

Because it's easier to get someone to pay $100 for something they aren't sure will work (and then have their beliefs confirmed) than to get someone to pay $1000 for something they aren't sure will work (and then have their beliefs refuted)?

I think it depends on the someone in question

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

#207

Post by comeonseriously »

ericmcer wrote: post #199
KennyBlanken wrote: post #163

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> For eyeglasses, if someone wants to continue the same prescription they can't. What? You don't need a medical prescription to order glasses online. You can put in whatever numbers you want and they'll happily make them. You'd be an idiot to do so, however, as your vision can change with age.

You 100% need a prescription to order prescription glasses or contact lenses online. Expired prescriptions will be rejected as well.

Contacts are regulated like drugs, so, yeah. But there is no such restriction on eyeglasses (in the U.S.). Depending on the state, they do "expire" (in FL it's 5 years), but you can still use it[0]. I have bought some beaters from Zenni and made the Rx up myself (I used to work in a lab a hundred years ago, so I can figure out how much more plus my readers need).

[0] Some places will reject it just because they don't want to deal with your complaints about a new pair not working. Other places will read what's on your current pair and match that. It really depends on who is making the glasses.

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

#208

Post by slownews45 »

kristofferR wrote: post #192
slownews45 wrote: post #181

Fantastic news. If you can afford the $5,000 - great! The current system works for you. 80% of people cannot and so are stuck. For folks with mild/moderate loss (where a LOT of people don't get help) something as simple as letting Apple tweak noise cancellation to be voice enhancing and providing a tuning and hearing test app in the iphone would be a godsend. The elderly miss out on a lot of family life because of he…

Yeah, the AirPods Pro's are amazing as hearing aids. The only issue is that they are very visible and only last 4 hours each charge (I suppose you could get two pairs and switch between them every four hours).

Airpods 3's should be 6 hours without spatial audio. And yes, I do use one at a time! The charge time is pretty quick.

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

#209

Post by jrace »

EastOfTruth wrote: post #198
dmurray wrote: post #160

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've long thought the problem with hearing aids is the calibration process. People (often old, confused, and less tech-familiar) try them on and spend half an hour answering questions about "does that sound better?" What if, instead, the calibration process worked constantly? Give the user a button to press when they don't hear something well, and another when they do. Let them have this for a month, let them try it…

> What if, instead, the calibration process worked constantly? Give the user a button to press when they don't hear something well, and another when they do. On TVs, they call those buttons volume buttons, it is revolutionary.

Hearing aids have volume controls, which some clinicians disable for new users - as it causes more problems than it fixes.

And just like the TV remote they increase all sounds - good (speech) and bad (music and explosions).

The issue is not just "is it loud enough" but rather, "can you understand what you want to hear when you want to hear it?"

imagine yourself at a busy restaurant. you want to hear your spouses speach better, and the wait staff- but turning their speech up also turns up the people you do not want to hear.

how do you fix that?

noise reduction, speech enhancement, directional microphones are just some of the tools a hearing aid uses.

But ultimately what needs to happen is your brain works harder at comprehending what you want to hear(yes, it is work, and like all work people do not want to do it).

So they think...hmmm, I will just pay $xxxx.xx and I wont have to work anymore.

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

#210

Post by EastOfTruth »

RHSeeger wrote: post #204
EastOfTruth wrote: post #198

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> What if, instead, the calibration process worked constantly? Give the user a button to press when they don't hear something well, and another when they do. On TVs, they call those buttons volume buttons, it is revolutionary.

A lot of the time it's not absolute volume. If you can't hear certain frequency ranges well, boosting the volume of all ranges is just going to drown out the ones you can't hear well.

so a smart volume button
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