My husband wears hearing aids..He just got a new $7,000 pair. He still asks me to repeat what I say.
He has a really difficult time using his phone. No dexterity and a soft voice ..I told him to use voice commands , but again his voice is too hard to understand.
It's a big struggle for everyone. Now, I just give doctors etc. my phone number. He also wears a medical necklace for emergencies. It detects falls.It has two way talk. At least I know he can contact someone in an emergency.

I reluctantly went to an audiologist a couple hears ago and was told I needed hearing aids. When they put them on me, I could have cried. I had not idea my hearing had deteriorated tO the degree it had. It was like I was placed in a different world, the background noise was too wonderful. I get like i had woken upI. t helped me understand to some degree why I was speaking softer. I was hearing things softer, and I think I was trying to match my tone to what I was hearing. .

My hearing aids area rechargeable, and I am happy with them. Using them with my iphone has been a challenge, but a lot of that is operator error. To me they have made a world of difference. I have to work on speaking with INTENT and will have to for the rest of my life. I always was soft spoken, but with PD, it got worse. The hearing aids have been helpful to me.

I get a new pair every three years. I'm almost a year into my third set.
The first set was about seven years ago and I just went with the free Starkey set supplied under the V. A. benefits plan. They provided me a set they get under a GSA contract, etc.. needless to say, it was the cheapest most basic hearing aids on the market, came preprogrammed with no adjustments available, was huge compared to the newer models. It had an on/off and volume button and went through batteries at an incredible rate. The only good part, was they didn't cost me anything. They just made everything louder, so in some environments they made all the noise overwhelming and I'd remove them. In a quite setting, they helped a little.
I tolerated the cheap set for three years. I learned the benefits of amplified hearing, so the 2nd go around, I chose to upgrade and paid the difference for the between the cheapest and most expensive set. It made a huge difference in my opinion of hearing aids. They was smaller, had basic bluetooth and some fine tuning and adjustments that was tailored to my hearing levels. They also had a better battery life and used about half as many batteries a year as the first set. I wore those for three years
My third set was purchased last December. Again, I went with Oticon's most advanced set. So far, I'm happy with their performance. They have a more advanced Bluetooth system. They have an application on my computer, phone and tablet allowing me to actually adjust all the settings. They have advanced software to identify and tune out background noise. They have software that cancels out my Tinnitus and adjust to my surroundings.
I don't remember exactly how much the difference was, it seems like I had $ 3,000 in hearing aid benefits, the benefits plan also had an auromatic discount applied and my out of pocket cost was about $3,000 as well.
It is money well spent, because without them, an alarm such as alarm clock, fire alarm, high pitched beeping, etc can be going off right beside me and I can not hear it at all. My ability to hear the high pitch decibels is completely gone. Some of it is the ringing in my ears. However, I can heat almost any sound with these newest hearing aids.
If you can, spend the money for the best set available.

I talked to my audiolo gist again. He gave me some other suggetions and they WORKED! Still not sure about the phone, but I am so happy now. Thank you all my Parkie friends for all the support, encouragement, ideas, and just so wonderful. JudyTx🌹

COSTCO has a good hearing aide program. Free valuation and reduced cost for premium hearing aides, if they are needed.