Join us as we explore a vital conversation on hearing health with Doug Leonard. Together, we break down misconceptions about easy fixes like AirPods and highlight the intricate nature of hearing solutions. Doug encourages listeners to take proactive steps in hearing health, offering insights into the difference professional audiology services can make in improving life quality. Whether navigating a holiday gathering or a sports event, discover how hearing connects us to the moments that matter.
It's Sound Advice with audiologist Doug Leonard from ASI, Audiological Services of Iowa, located right here in Carroll and celebrating 25 years in business. So Doug, the last couple of weeks we've been referring back to a commercial that Apple AirPod 2 Pro has and you put it out on your website because it's a great ad that really kind of drives home the fact that what people go through with a hearing loss and how that can really separate you from really enjoying your family, your friends, everything.
Yeah, I mean, our hearing is really, we always say, connects us to people, you know, and this ad does a great job of illustrating how he's struggling to be involved in his daughter's life. This is a guy, you know, in his mid-40s maybe or something, and they show clips of his daughter celebrating Christmas over the years. And they demonstrate, you know, what it's like for him to not be able to hear all those beautiful things that we experience as parents, you know. And of course, parents notice that with their kids' lives. And then we have, you know, we become grandparents at some time, hopefully. And so we really miss out on such important things when we have a hearing loss, especially untreated hearing loss.
If you're struggling to hear, there's no way you can look interested, look happy. You always look either confused or you look angry.
And none of those experiences, it seems like, are easy listening environments. You know, what happens all the time, constantly, I test patients hearing, they have hearing loss. It's probably significant hearing loss because they're finally in the office. But they haven't experienced any enhancement or improvement of their communication ability. So they tend to think, well, you know, I hear you just fine. Yeah, I'm a loud male talker in a quiet room sitting three feet away from you. So sitting in an examination room with an audiologist does not demonstrate how much hearing loss you have. And that's kind of the thing with this ad, too. It shows the before and after with him not hearing and then he is hearing later on. That's the same thing that we allow patients to do by doing a demo with hearing aids.
Yeah, one thing they don't show is him struggling in other scenarios. That's just sitting around your living room, opening presents in the commercial. He's struggling with that. Boy, think about the rest of the world when you go out.
Well, right. And those are the difficult environments. You know, it could be, again, family Christmas. You've got 15 grandkids running around and 40 people in the room. The music's playing. You know, everybody's spread out across the room. It could be you're going to your grandkids ballgame and try to talk and visit and always, you know, find out some information about the game. Those are challenging listening environments, and that's where hearing loss really has a bigger effect.
Yeah, and these AirPods are not the cure-all for everything, because there's a lot more to correcting someone's hearing problems than just popping in some earbuds.
Yeah, not really promoting my competition, so to speak. I don't pretend to compete with Apple, but they're in the over-the-counter realm, and we do diagnostic audiology with prescriptive solutions for people. Yeah. Love to hear from them if they have questions about that ad, about what we can do for them in 2025. Hopefully they're being proactive and doing their New Year's resolution to come in and have a hearing test. So they can give us a call at 792-5933.
Yeah, if you notice somebody withdrawing and being kind of off to themselves a lot, chances are they're probably struggling to hear and communicate and connect with people. So again, keep that number handy for ASI and give them a call in 2025. It's Audiological Services of Iowa.
