Advanced hearing aids with bluetooth for people with impaired hearing
Children with impaired hearing and adults with severe hearing disorders, covered by compulsory health insurance, can already acquire much more technologically-advanced hearing aids than ever before, featuring Bluetooth technology. Based on the amended technical requirements, as of October, health insurance funds have increased the reimbursable prices for hearing aids.
“We keep doing our best to make it better for the patients and follow the market situation. The National Health Insurance Fund had calculated the basic prices for the hearing aids, reimbursable from the Compulsory Health Insurance Fund, three years ago, which is plenty of time to introduce a new-generation of more technologically-advanced hearing aids to the market. Making the said changes, enabled the patients to acquire more advanced hearing aid to make their daily lives more comfortable.” says Giedrius Baranauskas, Head of the Medical Devices Reimbursement Division of the The National Health Insurance Fund (NHIF).
Recalculation of the prices has increased the basic price for children’s hearing aid on average by 44 per cent, reaching 540-580 Eur, while the price for adult hearing aid increased by 48 per cent, amounting to 380 Eur.
According to Baranauskas, the technical descriptions of the hearing aids were reviewed based on otorhinolaryngologist and patient opinions, suggesting to increase in the number of hearing aid channels and other additional device functions. The channel number for all types of children’s hearing aid was increased to more than 12 channels. The new functions in the description also included Bluetooth, a possibility to use the hearing aid or pair it with a streamer to stream the sound directly from a smartphone, tablet, or TV, and other requirements.
The requirements, applicable to hearing aids for adult patients with the highest degree of hearing loss will not change, except for increasing the channel number by 2 channels, i.e. to a total of 6 channels.
On average, health insurance funds reimburses 275 children’s hearing aids and 1800 adult hearing aids for adults with severe hearing loss every year.
In 2021, the Compulsory Health Insurance Fund allocated 2.5 million Eur to reimburse hearing aids and their adaptation costs, which is 223 thousand Eur more than in 2020.
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Last updated: 10-11-2021
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