OK, I admit it. When I came to my first church, I told them about wireless assisted listening devices for their sanctuary and I got TONS of brownie points for that. You would have thought I invented the things. Suddenly, all these folks started saying, “These last few years I didn’t realize how much of the service I was missing until I started wearing one of these little things in my ear.” Score!
But really, it should be a no-brainer that some people – particularly populations with hearing loss – will benefit immensely from a hearing assistance system. Getting some of them to use the thing? That’s a different story.
I remember growing up in a downtown church that was wealthy enough to afford some of the second-generation versions of these devices. (I call them second-generation because I imagine the first generation ones being a big cone people used to hold up to their ear before electricity was used.) The old ones in my church growing up had a wand that the user held in one hand and on the end of the wand was what looked like the speaker part of a telephone receiver. These were hardwired in so, of course, the users all had to sit on the one or two rows where the devices were installed. Good for the times but obviously not ideal.
Then along came wireless technology. For the first few generations of these new systems they were prone to interference from CB radios, your local fire department, and any number of other signals. But they were still an improvement.
In my last church, the sound guy decided to “value engineer” our own hearing assistance devices. He bought a low-power FM transmitter kit online and assembled it. Then he bought a bunch of little transistor radios and gave them out already tuned to the frequency he was using.
Pros: It was cheap. And we could broadcast the signal to the nursery in a whole other building where they could use a regular radio to pick it up.
Cons: The receivers would come off of tuning because people either got the volume knob confused with the tuning knob or they were tuning in the big game during the sermon. (Also, we pushed the limit on how much power we could pump through the broadcast antenna without an FCC license.)
Now, however, the cost has come down on many units and the quality has continued to go up. Here are some things to look for when shopping for an assisted listening device system:
- Individual volume controls.
- Strong user reviews about a system’s quality and range.
- An easily “expandable” system. (A reasonable cost for additional receivers, etc.)
- Anti-interference technology.
- Comfortable earpieces. Think about this, though:
- Over-the-head headphones are not discreet but might be best for people who cannot wear ear buds because of hearing aids.
- In-ear buds are probably best but they have foam covers that need to be routinely cleaned to prevent the spread of germs.
- Some new models hang under the chin and look like stethoscopes. Consider the aesthetics before buying.
