Benefits of the BTE Digital Hearing Aid
There are different styles of hearing aids that are available today as technology becomes more advances and the components of the hearing aid become smaller and smaller. This is an advantage to those with a hearing impairment so that, no matter what the severity of the problem, the hearing aid is nowhere near as large as the bulky devices used in the past. There are four main types of hearing aids: BTE (behind the ear), ITE (in the ear), ITC (in the canal), and CIC (completely in the canal) digital hearing aids. There are benefits and disadvantages to each type, but the one with the least disadvantages is the BTE digital hearing aid.
Advantages
The BTE digital hearing aid's main disadvantage is that it is not as cosmetically pleasing as the other, smaller hearing aids. However, technology has greatly helped with the design of the BTE digital hearing aids, making them smaller and more conformed to the ear so that the ear itself almost completely blocks the portion of the device that remains outside of the ear. This type of hearing aid is usually used with children since their hearing is constantly changing and the device has to be upgraded much more frequently than in adults. It is also used with individuals who have a severe to profound hearing loss.
The BTE digital hearing aids are less expensive than the other models because the devices can be pre-made as opposed to custom fitted each time. The only piece that is custom fitted is the ear mold which is what goes into the individual's ear, while the main part of the device can remain. Since the electronic components are cased in the part that goes behind the ear, these digital hearing aids are more powerful than the other types because the casing is larger to hold the electronics that are needed. They can also hold a larger battery size which means that they last longer before the battery needs to be replaced.
The BTE digital hearing aids are also beneficial since there are less problems with plugging from ear wax and drainage as will occur with other types of hearing aids. Since it is only the ear mold that is in the ear canal, the main part of the device remains untouched behind the ear, thus protecting it from these common issues that occur with other devices. The BTE digital hearing aids can also be used with loop systems and auditory training systems, where other devices do not have this capability.
Smaller Than Analog BTE Hearing Aids
In essence, digital BTE hearing aids are very much like the analog counterparts - at least on the outside. However, digital BTE hearing aids comprise a hearing aid case as well as an ear-hook extension as well as a tube which connects to an ear-mold. Nevertheless, both digital BTE hearing aids and analog BTE hearing aids are almost of the same size though the digital variety are supposedly smaller in size.
Another feature of digital BTE hearing aids is that they can fit behind as well as over your ears and the ear hooks fit over the front of a person's ears and also points in the direction of the ear canal. At one end of a tube there is an ear hook connected while the other end connects to the ear-mold in back part of the canal.
DSP or Digital Signal Processing chip is a special feature in digital BTE hearing aids which is not found in analog BTE hearing aids and this chip is in fact the brain center of each digital BTE hearing aids. The DSP chips have micro-circuitry that is very similar to what is found in the CPU of modern computers and in addition, these chips also come with software programs that have been burnt into the chips.
Digital BTE hearing aids that comprise of DSP chips can do a number of things. For one, they have multiple frequency response bands that are very similar to equalizers that are commonly found on music systems. Then, there are multiple channels which a user can select in order to accommodate different sound environments. Other features of these DSP chips are inclusion of noise reduction filters, dynamic contrast detection as well as multiple microphones.
