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Rechargeable vs non rechargeable hearing aids

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And for some it’s a lot easier to put the aids in a charger every night than to deal with batteries every few days given their fine motor skills, or rather lack thereof.

@jay_man2: I only posted that because for some of us - @cvkemp might be one other - that live in more rural environments, continuity of mains service overnight is definitely not a given. And there are lots of times, in an older home, that power receppacules are worn and a bit loose. Our Maine Coon Cat is bulky enough to knock a plug loose if he’s crawling around behind the night table.

[Hi there, BTW. Hope you’re well.]

To me it is all about what are you comfortable with. I learned a long time ago to be flexible. 8 years in the Navy will make you that way. Also, my dad was Navy and he raised me to be Navy also. We never knew where we would be the next day or even the next hour at times.

speaking of unlikely but possible contingencies: I can imagine batteries become scarce or unavailable due to supply chain issues. or again, living in a rural environment where batteries aren’t readily available…

I lost power this morning. It came on again less than an hour later. I imagine the majority of people live where there’s a pretty dependable power supply. What year is this? that said, I have an independent travel power supply/hard case carrier that will give three full charges to my aids before needing to be itself re charged. I’ve never needed to use it.
so far, I’m happy with my rechargeable aids, despite my initial reservations! Just as folks get used to carrying batteries around in case their aids run out of power, I’ve learned to recharge my aids when I’m sleeping. This last is simpler, and more dependable, in my experience.

In the perfect world: have one of each! That is my goal. I have found that there is a time and a place for both the battery-operated aids and rechargeables.

For now, my new aids are rechargeables - but that’s only cuz the so-called “waterproof” Phonak Life aids ONLY come in that form. My backup aids are Phonak Marvels that require batteries. I feel like that covers all bases.

With my cinderblock ears, I fall in the camp of “can NOT hear squat with no aids in” so I simply have to carry backups whenever I’m out of town. I need a functioning aid at my fingertips to even function myself!

Before the endless variants circling the globe, I travelled internationally every year. I never EVER wanted to have a dead set of ears going through Customs on any side of that trip. That’s what happened to a gal in my tour group, but her hubs was with her to “translate” to the official on her behalf.

Me? I’d probably be tossed in the CLINKER if I mimed “CAN’T HEAR YA!” and I don’t want to take that chance.

Everyone shouldn’t forget that rechargeable hearing aids are much more sealed and are quite a bit more resistant to moisture and dust. This translates in higher reliability and a lower failure rate. You can also charge them from just about anywhere. My hearing aid charger has a battery inside the unit which will charge them about three times. You can also plug the charger into any one of a number of portable power sources. I just plop my hearing aids into the charger at night when I go to bed and I haven’t run out of batteries in a long time.

I’ll go with rechargeables because I’ve got Essential Tremor.
People with dexterity issues may even have trouble inserting 'em in the charger, but it beats replaceable batteries everyday of the week!!

Edited

To me, aside from the dexterity issue which is obvious, it really boils down to whether you have a personal issue with having to change out the disposable batteries at an inconvenient time or not, especially if you’re at work or out to lunch or dinner with people and you don’t want people to see you change the batteries. Some folks could care less about doing this in front of people, but others may be more sensitive about doing that in front of people. Working people may be more sensitive about this than retired folks.

Of course you do get some prior warning via a low battery chime, but sometimes there may not be enough time between that and when the batteries go dead. And even if there’s enough time to change them out discreetly somewhere, the interruption can be considered a hassle by some, not to add that you’d also have to carry spare batteries everywhere with you.

Both sides all have valid reasons for their preferences. I’ve seen this debate hashed out to death and it can get quite heated sometimes. We just need to remember that nobody is right or wrong about any of this, it’s just about personal situations and personal preferences based on those situations.

I have rechargeable aids. They work fine most days. For some reason, however, on RV travel days they use up the battery by about 8:00 pm or so give or take. I have no idea why this is so, could be the extra noise in the motorhome that gets processed all day.

In reply to @Volusiano

@Volusiano said:

it really boils down to whether you have a personal issue with having to change out the disposable batteries at an inconvenient time or not,

All the decades I’ve worn aids, I’ve just marked the calendar and changed the batteries whether dead or alive - on the 6th day of wearing them.

Of course, there have been times when I’ve loaded a faulty battery or maybe didn’t quite open the battery door enough at night to turn the aids OFF. That’s when I got the “WHOOOPSIE!” tone, and was lucky to have spare batteries on me. :slightly_smiling_face:

And then there was the time my sister-in-law’s Weimaraner ATE one of my aids - battery and all. And then I was truly SOOL till I got back home. From that point on, I travelled with backup aids when on trips.

I’ve been happy with rechargeables in my Resounds, but when I was using Quattros, I had one pair rechargeable and a backup pair with 13 batteries. Now I’m using rechargeable Resound Ones and I am about to buy a spare pair, as they are so much better than the Quattro which are my spare pair at the moment. I think the next Ones will be rechargeable, but I haven’t quite decided.

Kind of off-topic, but I do think it’s a mistake to get into the mindset which tries to hide that you have to wear hearing aids. In my days of replaceable batteries, if I was chairing a work meeting and I got a low battery notification, I would ask one of the people next to me to take over the chair while I changed it. The only comments I got were the occasional person asking me afterwards about the battery (312 in those days) and being amazed when I said it would last me about a week.

Anyway hearing aids helpfully remind people that if I don’t react as expected to something they are saying, it’s not because I’m stupid, but that they aren’t talking loudly enough!

In reply to #39

@Zebras said: (unavailable)

The amount of faults people are having with rechargeable’s, I would personally would never go with rechargeable’s.

I know. This gives me serious pause as well. I ONLY got the rechargeable Phonak Life aids cuz they are supposedly waterproof, and it’s the only way they make them (for now). But if I have to change the tips on these new aids and render them NOT waterproof, I will likely turn them in for the new Paradise aids that have batteries.

The clock is ticking on my 60-day trial …

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