Tips for Traveling with Hearing Loss

One of the most difficult things to manage when you’re living with hearing loss is travel plans. You want to go away for the summer, but you’re just not sure how the hotel or the travel company you’ve booked with will accommodate for your needs – and that’s a worry that needs addressing right now. 

Hearing loss doesn't have to hold you back from enjoying a trip around the world; there are many ways you can make and keep traveling plans, and all it takes is a bit of forward thinking to ensure your vacation will go off without a hitch. Here’s the advice you should keep in mind:

Ask About Accessibility

The first thing to do is research the accessibility options present in both the accommodation you’re going to be staying at, as well as any group or travel company arranged activities that’ll be taking place during your trip. Be sure to inform the travel company as soon as possible to allow them time to arrange further accessibility options if you are in need of them. 

Similarly, you should be able to call ahead of time and ask the front desk of institutions such as hotels and hostels, museums and galleries, as well as theme parks or tourist attractions if they provide things such as hearing loops or the ability to transmit sound from a handheld tour guide speaker directly into your hearing aid, on their premises. 

Of course, you can look on the website for this information, but it’s also a good idea to get in touch directly to get the most up to date information from the organizers themselves. 

Inform Others About Your Hearing Loss

It can be hard to open up about your hearing loss needs, but don’t be afraid to inform the people you interact with about the fact that you wear hearing aids, or that you may need a sign language interpreter to be around at certain events, depending on your hearing loss experience. Knowing is half the solution and can ensure accessible options are made present for you during all group activities. 

Ultimately, it’s a good idea to let anyone you’re traveling with know, such as a travel partner you haven’t met before or the tourist group you’re a part of, how they can better help you to hear them when you’re out and about. If they know ahead of time, they’ll be more than happy to help, and you may make a few lifelong friends along the way. 

Take the right tech with you

There’s plenty of tech currently on the market that can help you to enjoy your trip away, and also make it much more convenient for you, if you’re living with hearing loss. You can download many helpful apps right to your phone, such as a text to speech program, that can help you to both communicate and interact with those in your environment and the environment itself. 

You can also download apps that can help you to travel with ease if you’re taking public transport on your journey, such as a sign language app that’ll allow a ticket conductor on a train to understand what you need to buy to reach your destination efficiently. 

Be sure to also make a proactive appointment with a hearing instrument specialist before you head away. After all, you don’t want to be miles away from your regular hearing specialist if something goes wrong! And whether you have an in-the-ear, behind-the-ear and in-the-canal hearing aid, a hearing instrument specialist will be able to perform either a hearing aid evaluation or repair, to make sure your aids are working perfectly in time for your upcoming vacation. 

Get support from Sound Choice Hearing

We have appointments of all kinds available, and whether you need some general advice, or you’d like a hearing test or hearing aid checkup, we’ve got time for you. One of our hearing instrument specialists can provide you with plenty of specific, targeted advice or perform non-invasive, essential tests that’ll help us to address your travel related hearing needs.

We know just how difficult it can be to make plans with hearing loss in mind, and we want to make managing these tasks easier for you. So, if an appointment with Sound Choice Hearing sounds like it could be of use to you, be sure to call us at (505) 565-7960 to talk to a representative.