4 Gift Ideas for Loved Ones with Hearing Loss

Knowing what to buy for someone with hearing loss can be challenging. You have to be careful what you choose. Unlike people who aren’t hard of hearing, there are some presents that they simply can’t enjoy. Fortunately, this post is here to help. Think of it as a kind of cheat sheet for finding gifts that your loved one will adore. See our ideas below.

Smart Watch

Smartwatches have been around for nearly a decade now. Early models were quite basic, displaying the time and allowing users to read messages via a Bluetooth connection to their smartphone. However, things are now significantly more advanced. Modern-day varieties perform an enormous range of functions to make users’ lives easier.

Notifications are smartwatches’ most basic function. Devices simply mirror alerts from paired smartphones. However, some devices have sophisticated sensors that can tell if the user has fallen over, informing friends, family and caregivers immediately. Biometrics is an increasingly sophisticated feature. Smartwatches have advanced sensors that can track things like heart rate, blood pressure, and even how much sleep a person is getting. All these metrics can be useful if your loved one has other health issues.

Additional functions include the ability to answer incoming calls via the smartwatch, track fitness activities, and use GPS location. In some cases, users can link their hearing aids to their smartwatch and control them from there (instead of their smartphone).

Vibrating Alarms

Conventional noise-generating bedside alarm clocks don’t make much sense for people with hearing loss. Most aren’t loud enough to jolt them from a deep sleep. And flashing lights don’t work too well either.

The answer is to use vibrating alarms instead, according to many brands. These work by attaching to the bed and shaking it violently, telling you to wake up. Most brands combine vibration with extra loud audible alarms to increase the chances of you waking up. Typically, you attach these alarms to the underside of your mattress. However, you can also put them on top of the mattress under the bed sheet, or on the inside of your pillow cover.

Wi-Fi Digital Doorbell

For people with hearing loss, listening out for the doorbell is a perennial challenge. Most standard models simply aren’t loud enough and don’t work at all for those with profound hearing loss.

Fortunately, technology is riding to the rescue. You can now buy digital Wi-Fi doorbells that work in completely different ways (and don’t rely on an audible tone at all). Digital doorbells comprise two main components: a receiver and a transmitter. Unlike conventional units, they don’t rely on a wire running from the bell button to a bell (or speaker system).

Installers place the transmitter on the outside of the house and the receiver on the inside. They then either hook it up to the mains or install a battery to supply power.

When a person comes to the door, they press the doorbell in the normal way. It will produce an audible tone (telling the visitor that they have been successful) and then send a notification to the user’s phone telling them that someone is at the door. They can then respond, even if they don’t hear anything at all.

Wireless doorbells tend to be incredibly easy to install. They have a longer range than regular wired doorbells, and they offer additional features, such as blocking background frequencies. Some also have LED lights and the ability to record personalized audio.

Directional Microphones

People who are hard of hearing find it incredibly challenging to focus on a single voice in a noisy environment, such as a bar. Hearing loss prevents them from homing in on specific conversations.

Technology can help, though. Hearing aid manufacturers are now making wearable assistive hearing devices that let users selectively tune into specific people in noisy environments. Small cameras armed with machine learning technology focus on the mouth, chin, and lip movements of the target person. It then selectively amplifies the sounds they are making while canceling out everything else.

Devices have two operating modes: single-speaker, and multi-speaker. In single-speaker mode, they focus on a single voice, blocking out all other sounds. In multi-speaker mode, they let the user focus on multiple voices, prioritizing those in front of them.

In summary, gifts can be highly beneficial for people with hearing loss. Often, they simply aren’t aware of what’s on the market that could serve their needs. If you’d like to learn more about hearing loss, get in touch with an audiologist at Clifton Springs Hearing Center today. Call 315-496-4314 to book a consultation.