Hearing Aid Resource for Consumers

How to Read Your Hearing Test

You have a moderate hearing loss. "Moderate" means just what it sounds like -- it is worse than "mild," not as bad as "severe."

You have a moderate hearing loss in the low frequencies, a severe hearing loss in the middle frequencies, and a total hearing loss in the high frequencies. Your EFFICIENT communication distance without hearing aids will be at your shoulder, though your ability to know that a voice is present will be as far as 6 to 10 meters, or 20 or 30 feet.

You absolutely need hearing aids. With hearing aids, you should be able to communicate with reasonable effectiveness at distances up to 3 meters, or 10 feet. You need to combine speechreading (a more accurate term for "lipreading") with what you can hear in order to converse. All conversations should be face to face, in quiet.

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