Full hearing test

The test takes an hour because hearing is more than a line on a chart. We start with a conversation: when do you notice difficulty, which situations are worst, does anyone in your family have hearing loss, have you had ear infections, noise at work, dizziness or ringing?

Looking in your ears

Next we look into both ear canals with an otoscope. About one in five people we see has enough wax to affect the test. If that is you, we can usually remove it in the same appointment for the wax-removal fee, then carry on.

The listening part

You sit in our quiet test room with headphones on and press a button each time you hear a tone, however faint. We test pitches from low to high in each ear, then play a small bone-conduction test behind the ear to see where any loss comes from. Finally, the speech-in-noise test plays sentences over background chatter, which tells us more about day-to-day hearing than tones alone.

What you leave with

A printed audiogram, a plain-English summary, and an honest answer: whether you need hearing aids, whether you might in a few years, or whether your hearing is fine. There is no obligation, and we do not follow up with sales calls.