Each individual reacts differently to the use of a hearing aid. One’s age, the severity of the hearing impairment and the acceptance of the need for the aid, may all strongly influence the reaction to supplementing hearing with amplified sound.

The type and degree of hearing impairment may affect the benefits to be gained from a hearing aid. Generally speaking, those with hearing impairment have a dual problem – reduction in the intensity of sound, in which every day noises, including speech, are not perceived at their normal volume; and usually an accompanying reduction in discrimination, which is one’s ability to distinguish among the sounds of speech, leading to a reduction in understanding.

If a person has an impairment of the conductive type, they can expect maximum benefits from a hearing aid because discrimination ability has not been greatly affected. Most people with this type of impairment adjust to using a hearing aid with very little difficultly.

If the hearing impairment is of the sensorineural or nerve type, there may be more difficulty adjusting to a hearing aid. Often, people who have this type of hearing loss can hear speech sounds if they are loud enough but cannot always understand what is being said. It is true that speech must be loud enough to permit the listener to understand to their full capability, but making speech increasingly louder will not necessarily lead to a corresponding improvement in discrimination because the hearing nerve has become less sensitive to the acoustic differences of speech sounds.

A hearing impaired person will often say, “I hear but I can’t always understand what I hear.” The major problem for a new hearing aid user is to adjust to hearing over background noise. Innovations in hearing aid fitting have made hearing in noisy situations more comfortable. Changes in circuitry of the hearing aid, specially designed ear moulds and highly adjustable aids have greatly eased the initial learning process for many patients.