
You are in the middle of a conversation when it starts: a thin, high-pitched whistle coming from your own ear. Everyone nearby can hear it too, which makes it ten times more embarrassing. That whistling is called acoustic feedback, and it happens when amplified sound leaks out of your ear canal and gets picked up…

There is a special kind of panic when your hearing aid suddenly goes silent. You tap it, you shake it, you stare at it as if staring will help. Before you assume the worst (and before you pay for a repair), work through this checklist in order. It is organized from the simplest, most common…