For others, it is helpful to be able to see the controls to change volume and settings, rather than having to grope and guess at the ear. The down side is that the remote is an extra thing to keep track of, and you have to have either a pocket or purse to carry it in, or a good memory to recall where you set it down last. People considering higher technology instruments should give some advance thought to how they feel about a remote control. Battery life . Many patients ask why hearing aid batteries must be replaced every one to four weeks, while wristwatch batteries last a year or longer.
Hearing aids draw more current from batteries than wristwatches do.
A watch battery ticks off the seconds, minutes and hours day in and day out, with no variation. A hearing aid battery, however, functions continually and must power a mini amplifier, microphone, speaker, and in the case of programmables, a computer chip. Although the two devices may use the same type of batteries, like zinc air, a hearing aid uses much more energy each day. Hearing aids which look alike and use the same size battery may get much different battery life. The type of aid circuitry inside, as well as the power of the instrument, determine how long the battery lasts.