To be proactive with your hearing health, it's important to have any hearing issues checked out as soon as you develop them. Your sense of hearing is important to your daily life, whether you're communicating with coworkers or having dinner with friends. A hearing test is an excellent way to determine not only if you have hearing loss but to establish a baseline for future exams, as well. 

Hearing tests are an important process when it comes to diagnosing and treating hearing loss. This provides the audiologist with a wealth of information, from the severity of your hearing loss to the best ways you can benefit from hearing aids. Familiarize yourself with what you can expect during your hearing test with the following list:

Your first appointment

Your first appointment is key to this process, but there are a lot of factors you need to keep in mind when you're trying to prepare for the ultimate hearing test appointment. At your first audiology appointment, there are a lot of things that your audiologist is going to need to know. 

They will inquire about your medical history, as well as assessing any symptoms you might have. These are important details because certain conditions and medications can affect the severity of symptoms you are experiencing. The audiologist will talk you through these various scenarios to paint a clearer picture of your symptoms and condition. This knowledge allows you to understand what the test will entail and will provide you with peace of mind in knowing what to expect when moving forward. 

Examination and assessment

An examination and assessment is the key part of the process, and you need to make this a key part of your hearing test experience. The first part of this is the physical ear examination, which will be carried out by your audiologist, and this will determine if there is any medical reason behind your hearing loss. Then there will be a comprehensive hearing test, which involves listening to a series of tones, sounds and words to determine where your issues lie. The assessment and examinations will cover all the bases that an audiologist feels are needed to determine what your hearing is like. 

Results

Once you have had the tests run, you are then going to need to get the results, and these can be either same-day or a few days later. Generally, what will happen is that your audiologist will meet with you to discuss your results and talk to you about what the future plans will be for your hearing treatment.