Hearing Aid Company of Texas discuss the new regulations including a standard rating system and labeling requirement as a help for consumers shopping for the right hearing aid compatible mobile phone,
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Selecting a Cell Phone that is Compatible with Your Hearing Aids
1.
Hearing
Aid
Company
of
Texas
| (361)
356-‐4003
| http://hearingaidcompany.com
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Selecting a Cell Phone that is Compatible with Your
Hearing Aids
Hearing aids have not previously always worked well with mobile phones, because of electronic
interference between the 2 devices that caused static, whizzing or screeching noises, or dropped
words. New government regulations, together with considerable advances in both cell phone and
hearing aid technology, have made this incompatibility rare. To help consumers shop for the right
hearing aid compatible mobile phone, the new regulations include a standard rating system and
labeling requirement.
To understand how this rating system works, you should first understand the two modes that
hearing aids work in – M mode (for microphone) and T mode (for telecoil). In M mode, your
hearing aid uses its built-in microphone to pick up audible sounds from the environment and
amplify them so that you can hear them. When
the hearing aid is in T mode, instead of the
microphone it uses its built-in telecoil to directly
pick up conversations from inside the phone, in
the form of electromagnetic signals. Roughly
60 percent of all cell phones sold in the US
have a telecoil (T) mode.
Under the new regulations, these two modes of
operation have ratings that range from 1 (the
lowest sensitivity) to 4 (the highest sensitivity).
To be labeled as hearing aid compatible (HAC)
a cell phone must carry a minimum rating of
M3 or T3.
Hearing aids themselves also carry M and T ratings to indicate their sensitivity and ability to block
interference in each mode. When shopping for a phone, to determine its compatibility with your
hearing aid, simply add its M and T ratings together with those of the phone to create a combined
rating. A combined rating of 6 or more is considered excellent, a hearing aid/phone combination
that would provide highly usable, interference-free performance. A sum of 5 is considered normal
and should work fine for typical mobile phone users. If the combined rating is 4, this is thought of
as acceptable but not very usable if you make a lot of extended phone calls.
If you are shopping for a mobile phone online, you can usually use this combined rating to
determine how compatible the phone you are interested in buying will be with your hearing aid. A
2.
Hearing
Aid
Company
of
Texas
| (361)
356-‐4003
| http://hearingaidcompany.com
Discover more great content here:
http://twitter.com/hearingaidco
http://www.facebook.com/HearingAidCompanyOfTexas
http://www.youtube.com/hearingaidcompany
http://www.pinterest.com/hearingaidtexas
better approach, of course, would be to go to a store that allows you to “try before you buy,” and
actually use the phone you want while wearing your hearing aid, in both M and T modes.