First, go to an audiologist and get a hearing test. That will tell you what your specific hearing loss is. For example, my wife's hearing loss is in the moderate to severe range for higher tones and severe in the lower tones. With the Jabra Enhanced 500 that she just got the tech can adjust, modify, and customize for her specific hearing loss. Then she can fine tune with her phone for different environments (church, restaurant, private conversation, etc.). They connect to her phone via blue tooth. She also has a "tv streamer" that plugs into the tv so that the sound is fed directly into her hearing aids. They don't replace natural hearing but certainly a lot better than deafness. She tells me that when she takes them out at night to put in the charger her "world goes silent." The charger also is capable of retaining about three days worth of charge if we are on a trip and are unable to plug in for some reason.