How Humidity Affects Your Hearing Aids

Summer is just arriving and that means vacations, days out and more fun things with the family. When your summer break is ahead of you, you want to do your very best to look after your health throughout. The best thing that you can do is remember your sunscreen, wear your sunglasses, stick to the shade and look after your hearing aids!

When you had your hearing aids fitted by your audiologist, you may not have been taught how to care for your hearing aids in hot weather. Believe it or not, your hearing aids are going to be affected by humidity outside. The world is far more enjoyable when your hearing is being supported by the right hearing aids, but you can’t get out and enjoy the summer sunshine if your hearing aids start glitching because it’s warm outside. You won’t be able to hear all those sounds of the summer you’ve been missing unless you know how to better look after your hearing aids in the summer.

When you bring your laptop or your smartphone outside, you do what you can to ensure that your devices are looked after and not affected by the heat and your hearing aids are no different. With a little more understanding, you can ensure that the tiny, miraculous computers you are wearing at the side of your head are intact and working properly.

What Is Humidity?

Humidity is simply the measurement of water vapor in the air. Those long, lazy summer days are packed with hot air and the moisture held in that hot air is at a higher level. You get sticky when it’s a humid day because the warmth in the air interacts with your body temperature. This leads to your sweating and feeling damp – and so you have to consider how your hearing aids are going to react to the same humidity around you. 

Hearing Devices and Humidity

Humidity in the air affects your hearing devices in more ways than you think. The most important thing to remember is that moisture is the result of warm aid meeting the cool metal of your hearing device. The tiny components inside the device are also affected, and this can really affect the way in which your hearing aids work.

As well as the hearing device in your ears effectively sweating, you will be sweating. Humidity makes it much harder for the sweat to evaporate the way that it usually would as the air is already packed with moisture. This means that much of your sweat is going to end up in your hearing aids, which is not ideal for the inner components! But how does all of that moisture in the air and on you cause such trouble for your hearing?

Moisture and Your Hearing Aids

When you have an appointment with an audiologist and they are going to talk you through your hearing health, you’re going to hear the phrase water is bad when it comes to your hearing aids. Think about it – you wouldn't chuck a cup of water all over your laptop because of all of the tiny components that you would be affecting. It can corrode the inner components and the battery contact points. Well, the hearing aid is the same. The microphones and receivers are affected and can short circuit, which is just not what you want for your hearing aids. Moisture is your hearing aid’s kryptonite, and while a little exposure doesn't matter too much, too much exposure will end with a lot of damage to the performance of your device.

Signs of damage caused by humidity

There are plenty of ways to check whether your hearing aids are damaged by the humidity in the air around you, and these signs include:

• Static and crackling noises in the ear
• Distortion in the sound you hear
• Sound cutting out in loud noises
• Sound keeps fading in and out 
• Device doesn't work as much

Preventing Moisture

You can use air purifiers to remove moisture from your hearing aids, and you can leave the battery door of the hearing aid open, too, to let the moisture dry out. Speak to your audiologist, too, as they may have a hearing aid dryer that you can use to ensure that your hearing aids are dried out completely. You can also use measures like hearing aid sweatbands, which are designed to keep moisture out of your hearing aids. Exercising only during the cool parts of the day and removing your hearing aids when you do workout. 

The other thing that you can do is speak to the experts at The Hearing Clinic at Woodlake by calling us at (612) 246-4868.