Behind-the-ear (BTE) hearing aids are among the most preferred hearing aids used by people with hearing loss. A BTE hearing aid fits behind its user’s ear and is connected by a tube to the speaker which is placed in the ear opening. Though there are some users who worry how they look like with this kind of hearing aid, others do not really care since they get better performance with it, especially if they are using digital BTE devices such as Siemens hearing aids.
Digital BTE Hearing Aid
BTE hearing aids have an amplifier, battery, ear hook, ear mold, speaker and microphone. What sets a digital BTE hearing aid from the analog BTE is its smaller size. They also have a hearing aid case and an ear-hook extension. The main reason why the digital BTE hearing aid is more popular is that most of its function features are better than that of the analog kind.
Digital BTE Hearing Aid Features
Digital BTE hearing aids have these features which are not available in analog BTEs. The following are some of the reasons why digital BTEs are more in demand:
- Excellent size and fit – a lot of digital BTE hearing aids are not bulky compared to their analog counterparts. Miniature digital BTE hearing aids are fairly small and they also fit well behind the ear since the main shell section and ear mold are customized to fit the user.
- Discreet – most of the latest digital BTE hearing aids nowadays have very thin and nearly invisible tubes that connect the shell to the earpiece. Some brands of digital BTEs are often mistaken as Bluetooth earpieces since they look just like them.
- Digital Signal Processing or DSP chip – this is the brain of digital BTE hearing aids. The micro-circuitry of the DSP chip is akin to what is found in the CPUs of the latest computers. DSP chips have multiple functions: they have numerous multiple frequency response bands that are very much like those in equalizers, and they have a lot of channels which users can choose in order to adapt to various sound environments.
- Affordable – digital BTE hearing aids are among the cheapest to purchase hearing devices in the world since they are fairly common and can easily be found. The batteries of this hearing aid need not be charged frequently too.
- Child-friendly – most children with hearing ailments use digital BTE hearing aids since they fit into place. Other hearing devices such as in the canal (ITC) or in the ear (ITE) hearing aids such as the Bionic Hearing Aid are best worn by adults. Children, however, need more supervision if they will wear those other types of hearing aids unlike digital BTEs.
Digital BTE hearing aids are considered to be more powerful than other kinds of hearing aids but the downside is that users should expect that digital BTE hearing aids are larger compared to those that are almost invisible hearing aids. However, if users would prefer better sound quality and affordability over appearance, then they should give digital BTEs a try.
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