Your hearing is vital to your well-being. It’s important to get it checked, especially if you have hearing loss, ear pain, or discomfort. Our experienced audiologists can visit your home or see you at our clinic in Hebden Bridge. We offer a thorough hearing assessment and a personalised care plan.
Clinic visit prices apply; home visits include an extra £20 charge. If you purchase hearing aids, we will discount them by the cost of the hearing assessment.
We like to offer choice, so we offer two types of hearing appointments.
Our premium hearing assessment includes pure tone audiometry, speech testing, tympanometry, and, where relevant, a demonstration of hearing solutions, including hearing aids and hearing technologies such as TV streamers.
When to book:
- You have had hearing loss identified in the past.
- You are wearing a hearing solution from another provider and looking to improve your benefits.
- You want to understand your hearing and speech understanding in difficult situations fully.
Our premium hearing assessment includes the following:
- A medical questionnaire and hearing consultation
- Ear examination & health check: If any occluding ear wax is present, we will remove it, where possible, at the same appointment at no additional cost.
- Full diagnostic hearing assessment
- Speech in noise testing
- Hearing aid demonstration
- Environment simulation within areas you have identified,
- Demonstration of accessories relevant to you.
- Full Hearing report for your records
£75 Time: 1.5-2 hours
Standard hearing assessment.
Our Standard hearing assessment offers a complete overview of your hearing and provides a comprehensive picture of any hearing loss.
When to book:
- You are unsure you have hearing loss but would like a check-up on your hearing health.
- You are monitoring a previous audiogram.
- You wish for a second opinion regarding your hearing.
- You need a hearing report for employment.
Our standard hearing assessment includes the following:
- A medical questionnaire and hearing consultation
- Ear examination & health check: If any occluding ear wax is present, we will remove it, where possible, at the same appointment for an additional fee of £40.
- Pure tone audiometry with air conduction and bone conduction with masking where appropriate
- Hearing report for your records
£55 Time: 45 mins
Hearing loss can be caused by several factors — a buildup of earwax, damage from working in noisy environments, illness, and ageing. The common signs of hearing loss are:
- Difficulties comprehending what other people are saying, especially in noisy environments,
- Asking people to repeat themselves often, sometimes more than once
- Listening to music or watching TV at a volume higher than necessary or people commenting that it’s loud.
- Difficulties hearing on the phone,
- Difficulty following a discussion within groups
- Exhaustion or tension from having to pay attention while listening
- Making excuses to not do activities because you worry about not following conversations.
- People sound like they are mumbling.
- Tinnitus (ringing or buzzing sounds in ears)
Hearing loss affects 12 million of us in the UK, and the world health organisation places hearing loss within the top 5 disease burden of the world, so it’s more common than you think.
Research through brain scans has shown that hearing loss may contribute to a faster rate of atrophy in the brain.
We witness higher social isolation due to hearing loss. This may make us want to be with people less, and we may not engage in conversation as much. These factors may contribute to dementia both developing and advancing. Research shows hearing loss can increase the risk of dementia by up to five times. The evidence also suggests that hearing aids may reduce these risks.
Hearing loss may affect your balance because as you walk, your ears pick up sound cues, such as your foot-dragging, that help balance. When we are affected by hearing decline, these sound cues are. Additionally, your brain works harder to process sound, and this subconscious trying to understand the sounds around you may interfere with the mental processing needed to walk safely.
We get more tired when we struggle to hear, which affects our ability to understand people and can further limit our enjoyment of social gatherings; people can withdraw and suffer from loneliness and depression.
The evidence suggests that people wait, on average, 10 years before seeking help for their hearing loss. This is upsetting and demonstrates a great need for better awareness around hearing health and normalising getting your hearing checked, like getting your eyes or teeth checked, so intervention can be made earlier.
Interestingly with over-the-counter hearing aids now available in America, they have reduced from 10 years to 6. We’ll keep an eye on this new method for accessing hearing aids and hope it will achieve its goal of better access and hearing care for all.
Your Hearing is Unique to You and only you; I may be an expert in hearing, but you’re the expert in your hearing. After you have chosen between the standard and premium assessment, we then complete 4 steps:
Step one
Welcome
We get to know you and complete an entire clinical history about your ear health and hearing past; we like to understand more about your lifestyle and what you wish to achieve from the hearing assessment, how you cope and what you do to help yourself know people.
Step two
We assess the physical health of your outer ear and ear drum with care and attention.
We use video technology to look inside your ear canal. We assess the health of your eardrum and check for blockages, including ear wax; if you want, you can watch this on our screen.
For our premium hearing assessment, we continue to assess your middle ear and ear drum using clinical tympanometry. Sometimes the eustachian tubes that connect the middle ear to the upper throat can become blocked after colds and other upper respiratory viruses. You could be affected by otitis media with effusion, also known as “glue ear”, or maybe have a small perforation.
This can be done upon request or after ear wax removal for an additional £20.
It’s about ear health as well as hearing health
Step three
Assessing your hearing ability
We complete your hearing assessment using pure tones; this is a clinical assessment and requires some work as we ask you to press a button every time you hear sounds, no matter how small. We are assessing both the very quiet and your tolerance to loud sounds.
For our premium customers, we complete speech-in-noise assessments to check your understanding of challenging listening situations.
Step four
Information download,
We discuss your hearing results and give you time to ask any questions you may have regarding your hearing; we advise your next steps and may request you seek medical intervention. However, we will help you with this by completing a hearing report.
For our premium assessments, we then assess your suitability for hearing technology. We complete a demonstration of hearing aid technology and guide you through the benefits and limits of different technologies.
Finally, we complete a written report of your results. You get this emailed for your records or can discuss the following appropriate actions with your surgeon. Additionally, we work with private Ear, Nose and Throat specialists. We can refer you to them if we need more investigations.
Hearing is one of the most important senses when it comes to communicating with others and creating more profound, meaningful connections. Like your sense of sight, it can lose sharpness over time and hamper your ability to connect with your friends, family, colleagues and loved ones. With a hearing test, we can help determine your hearing condition and put your mind at ease by knowing you’re taking care of your hearing health.
