Hearing aid prices
2014-01-16 18:55:30.335826+00 by
Dan Lyke
1 comments
New York Times: The Hunt for an Affordable Hearing Aid, on the tremendous markup and high pressure strategies used for hearing aids, which are increasing in price at 8% a year while all other electronics are getting cheaper, and why CostCo might be the break in the trend.
“The big discussion right now in the industry is about unbundling,” said Audicus’s founder, Patrick Freuler. “The consumer has absolutely no idea how much is the cost of the device, how much is the cost of the service that went into testing, advising, programming, your after-sales support. All the customer sees at the end of it is one big fat price tag that says, ‘$2,000.’ ”
And also why the markup might be worthwhile if your audiologist really is good.
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#Comment Re: made: 2014-01-17 01:49:28.072661+00 by:
TheSHAD0W
You know, I kept reading about all the advances around hearing aids, and compatibility, and had this idea...
The newest hearing aids have little computers in them, which do equalization for people with hearing deficiencies; one of the issues is getting an audiologist to tune them for your hearing. Well... Let's say you added bluetooth to the mix. Not only could the hearing aid also act as a wireless headset for your smartphone (and I think some are already doing this), but you could have an app in the phone perform a hearing test and program the aid for you, skipping the need for an audiologist.
Add wireless charging to the mix, and...