I really struggled tonight at a Christmas function in a local bowling club. Lots of loud announcements, many groups eating and conversing and my hearing aids delivered every skerrick of all of that sound to the point where I was overwhelmed and even had difficulty chatting to my immediate neighbours. Some suggested leaving the aids at home, but with a high-range hearing loss that makes it very difficult to comprehend female voices. I'm tempted to offer club management some training in microphone technique for their staff.
I find that by lowering the volume and switching from "Dining Mode" to "Party Mode," I can tune out a lot of the noise. When I can't, I simply turn them off for the duration. Seldom are the objectionable sounds not loud enough that I can't hear them (more's the pity).
In movie theaters (what's a movie theater? I haven't been in one since March) I simply take the hearing aids out and put my earplugs in.
What Miss Amanda said. My hearing aids call it comfort mode. I use it also when Mr. Image who refuses to wear hearing aids turns the TV up loud so he can hear.
I am bitterly disappointed and angry. There was one option I really need on my aids - and they came up with an aid that didn't have it. It was for the loop system with effectively means that the words spoken into a microphone that uses the system are heard in your head with no background noise. The young audiologist suggested I just turn the aid up - totally ignoring the fact that this would increase the background noise too. I didn't think this through at the time - it was only when I got home I thought it through and realised how stupid her suggestion was. As the hearing clinic is on my bus route I took everything back the next day and wrote a note to the chief audiologist saying that I was disappointed with their service. She emailed me back and has ordered hearing aids that have the loop system as an option.
I have also suggested that I start the new ones at a lower setting and gradually increase the volume because the sound level was too high and left me very distressed and shaken. An audiologist I consulted years ago said there was a very narrow band between what I could hear and what I could bear.
I have an appointment just before Christmas and hope they have all the bits by then, so I can trial another pair.
Huia, that's so unfortunate and disappointing. So far we've been lucky and not needed hearing aids, and hope that continues to be the case. So many people seem to have trouble with something that really should be improving their lives.
So many people seem to have trouble with something that really should be improving their lives.
They're imperfect at best. They will never restore natural hearing, but there are good ones and bad ones.
The first hearing aids I bought, on recommendation from a friend, were not adjustable for dining mode, party mode, etc. The volume controls were tiny buttons located on the aids themselves -- you had to press the buttons to raise or lower the sound. The first time I dined out in a restaurant, the sound of dishes and silverware clanging into each other from the kitchen drove me bonkers! After about a week, I took the aids back to the dealer and received a full refund, no questions asked.
My present aids (from another dealer) are adjustable via a remote control device. Also via an app on my phone, although it doesn't work well. Much better. Still, I see that other people have aids with bluetooth capability so that they can directly interface with phone, computer, and (I would imagine) loop systems in churches, etc. This feature would be nice to have, but I can live without it.
I do find that when playing the piano I have to shut the aids off, as they make the piano sound tinny and out of tune. This despite there being a "music" setting that really doesn't help much.
Miss Amanda, music was the other settling on my old hearing aids. Listening to the radio or recorded music it didn't seem to make much difference, but live music was very much enhanced, for example the organ at church sounded so much richer with that setting.
I have asked to explore other settings when I go back to the audiologist, but I may put that off while I get used to the basics as I don't want to be overwhelmed as I was the other day, It definitely rocked my confidence in the audiology practice I use and in my ability to communicate what I need. I felt like a doddery old lady.
@Huia I think you are wise to take one step at a time. When I received my aids the audiologist was trying to show me how all the different parts could work, how to clean them, how to change the battery, how to change the wax guard, then how to set the different moods, how to talk on the phone, how to use the remote, how to set for music, how to set in a noisy environment. I felt really confused and ended up just going at my own pace and having him show me one thing per visit, after the regular maintenance stuff.
Can I suggest that as a precaution, you email the audiologist and give details of the problems you're experiencing but also say that you're going to give them a longer trial to see if you can get better results and more accustomed to them. With luck all the problems will either be worked out, but if you do need to seek a refund an email like this shows both that you've been having problems from the start, and also that you've been reasonable in giving them a decent trial.
I have already taken them back Gee D, access to the loop system is a non-negotiable as far as I am concerned, and those aids didn't have it as an option. I included a note reiterating that I needed to have access to the loop system. A, the chief audiologist, emailed that she is sourcing aids that include the loop option. She agrees that I will need to get use to the increased sound gradually. I haven't handed over any money yet, (due to a glitch over which of my accounts their machine could access) and even if I had A says they are regarded as on trial until problems are sorted.
So the situation now is that I have another appointment 2 days before Christmas. They will have alternative hearing aids available then* and I will then trial them.
Apart from the loop issue, the problem is that technology has improved so much in the last 6 years in both volume and clarity that I find it overwhelming - one audiologist I consulted years ago said that there wasn't a big difference between what I could hear and what I could bear. I currently have my current aids set at their loudest setting to try to widen that range.
*subject to them being in the country, but that is outside our control.
GI, thanks for your comment. I am, in the words of the late shipmate Uncle Pete, a techno-peasant, so will probably do something similar to what you suggest. The practice runs a drop-in clinic so if I get really stuck I can pop in for help without an appointment - luckily it's on my bus route too.
I do want to say that this clinic has always been first class as far as I and other people to whom I have referred to it are concerned. A, the audiologist I have consulted in the past was unwell so I saw a woman who is trained, but lacks the level of experience (I don't think anyone in the South Island, possibly in the whole country has J's level of experience and expertise.) She is also very approachable and willing to go the extra mile for people.
Well, the anaesthetist, who I thought would be the stand-out cost, has just mailed "No gap". Waiting to hear from the hospital, but I'm pretty sure that their gap will be $500 or less. The audiologist has confirmed that 3 x 2 hour post-implant mapping sessions are bulk-billed.
So a $40,000 device, surgery, an overnight hospital stay and multiple post-implant mappings, will set me back a maximum of $1,000. Were I to use a different surgeon and hospital, not even the $1,000. That's "socialised medicine" for you. Thankyou Gough (won't mean anything to non-Aussies, nor even Aussies of the generations after Gough who don't know how much they owe to him.)
The aids that I've just received don't have the loop option either. Last time I had to ask the audiologist to add it as he couldn't see why anyone would need it! I still haven't phoned up to say I need them re-set but I tried using them again and they still weren't loud enough. In the UK aids are free via the NHS but of course you don't get the ones with advanced features that I would privately. I did have private aids once, but they weren't great either, though much prettier than the NHS ones.
In my aids, the party option filters out sound coming from behind me, and amplifies sound coming from in front. I expect that yours does something similar.
It was funny because the audiologist suggested it and I said, "Oh Miss Amanda has that". The clinic will contact me when the replacement ear mould comes in and we will review next steps at the end of January. I am vey happy.
I imagine that the aids are improving all the time. A lovely old dear in our congregation spent about treble what you did - and that was a dozen years ago - and had great trouble with them. The audiologist's comment was that some people just seemed to have difficulties, not much assistance at all. She would have done better to have had a decent, relaxing holiday.
Actually my father had so much trouble with his that I swore I would never get them myself. But aside from the first pair, which I took back, I've had no trouble with mine and am quite used to them now.
I've just had a very annoying visit to the audiology clinic. My new hearing aids were sent in the post before Christmas but were far worse than my current ones. I couldn't get hold of the clinic to talk about it and just stuck the new ones in a drawer and forgot about them. A couple of weeks ago I got a letter asking if they were OK and to phone if they weren't. I phoned and explained to the receptionist how bad I thought the new aids were and she went to check what sort of appointment was needed.
I went today and she'd just booked me in for a lets give your aids a minor tweak session. The audiologist got off on the wrong foot when she suggested that maybe I hadn't put batteries in the new aids. Things went downhill after that and no amount of her fiddling with the new aids could make her sound anything other than she was in a tin box on a distant planet. She's going to book me a longer appointment to try and get them sorted. When I do go I'm taking my husband as one, he is my reference for how well I can hear things and two, he is very good at calming me down when I start getting stroppy!
I've recently acquired (at vast expense) my first set of hearing aids. Having been on the NHS waiting list for about six months, I decided to go to Boots and see what they could do.
I'm beginning to get used to them, although I'm not as impressed as I'd hoped.
Then, yesterday I heard from my sister that an appointment has been sent to me at her address (where I was living until recently) for NHS audiology on 1st March.
Now why did that have to happen after I'd spent ££££s on them?
The Boots ones are still "on approval", although I've paid for them, so I suppose it's possible I could get get my money back if the NHS comes up with something better.
I'd go to the NHS appointment, just to see what the difference is. After my experience my my audiology clinic today I'm seriously considering seeing what Specsavers would provide.
Definitely take up the NHS appt. For one thing, it would mean the long-term maintenance and possible future upgrade of the aids (not to be too gloomy, hearing loss does tend to increase over time).
Nor is it the worst thing in the world to have spare aids.
How many of you with hearing aids wear them at home? I was surprised to notice that 10 days into a move into a new home, I have yet put in my hearing aids. I have very little trouble hearing Mr. Image most of the time and as he is going deaf and refusing to get aids I do not mind also saying, "Sorry I did not hear that." I have had very few phone calls at our new number, and I have an amplified phone, so just do not miss not wearing the aids. I don't bother with them walking the dog and other than that I have not left the house. I am guessing one should wear them more often than not. Not sure.
Firstly because I can't adequately hear Mr F, the TV, the doorbell or the phone without them. And secondly the research that reports the loss of capacity in the brain to process sounds to which it is not exposed. I want to keep the spectrum of what I can hear as broad as possible as long as possible.
And secondly the research that reports the loss of capacity in the brain to process sounds to which it is not exposed. I want to keep the spectrum of what I can hear as broad as possible as long as possible.
This is why I wear my hearing aids when home alone - also to tune into the various birds that yell at each other in my section. I think Aroha (cat) has become more vocal too, or maybe she was but I just didn't hear her. I also find that if I wear them most of the time, my hearing is better when I'm not wearing them. I know that sound weird, but apparently I am not imagining this --- it's something about the brain being more tuned to sound.
I keep finding out new things too - like the difference in the tyre noise between a car driving down a wet road and a dry road and the sounds of the various waterfowl on the river and gulls flying overhead. I can't think of anything I have bought that has given me so much pleasure as my current hearing aids.
I never put my hearing aids in before I have my morning shower though because of horror stories from a woman with whom I once worked. Her father had walked into the shower so many times with his aids in place that the insurance company refused to cover any more of them. (Just in case I always stick my fingers in my ears to check before I get into the shower - yes- I am that paranoid and my new aids are so small I am less aware of having them in my ears).
How many of you with hearing aids wear them at home? I was surprised to notice that 10 days into a move into a new home, I have yet put in my hearing aids. I have very little trouble hearing Mr. Image most of the time and as he is going deaf and refusing to get aids I do not mind also saying, "Sorry I did not hear that." I have had very few phone calls at our new number, and I have an amplified phone, so just do not miss not wearing the aids. I don't bother with them walking the dog and other than that I have not left the house. I am guessing one should wear them more often than not. Not sure.
I haven't worn mine for over a year - since the pandemic started, and socialising stopped. I only really need them when meeting people in groups. Mine are standard NHS ones though, and a bit bulky - when at home I wear blue tooth headphones to listen to the radio/television a lot of the time. Wearing them with hearing aids would I think be uncomfortable.
I've read what @Firenze and @Huia said though. I don't like the thought that I may be going more deaf through not wearing the hearing aids
I put mine in every morning after showering and dressing, and they remain in until I undress for bed. (Although the past two mornings I've forgotten to put them in -- old age?) They stay in, whether I go out or am just in the house.
I find I can't hear the TV without them. As for the telephone, I usually put the phone on speaker. Unfortunately my aids do not include bluetooth -- the next pair will for sure.
I play my (digital) piano through headphones, and so the mics in the hearing aids do not pick up the sound and the piano sounds natural. If I play through speakers, or if I play an acoustic piano, I have to turn the aids off as they make the piano sound tinny.
I can hear very little without mine, but I must admit if I'm home alone I tend not to wear them as they aren't the most comfortable of things. However now my husband has retired I'm rarely home alone anymore so I am wearing them more.
So far, I've been taking them out as soon as I get home from work: I live alone and haven't yet got a TV, so there's really nothing for me to hear. I still find them not exactly uncomfortable, but not unnoticeable either, so it's still a relief to take them out.
I'm also still not convinced that the difference they make is justifying the expense; the floorboards in my flat are creaking fortissimo, and the birds are singing, but it seems to me that they amplify everything except the human voice, which is un fat lot de bon.
Piglet, when I discussed a friend who never wears his with the audiologist she said about 4 hours a day would be a minimum- so your time at work would cover that. If the NHS have different h/aids your experience with them may differ from your current ones.
When I first got hearing aids I gradually increased the time I wore them, then the volume was turned up so I had a more gradual introduction.
I'm going back sometime in mid-March to get these ones turned up.
There are different types of aid. One sort I tried picked up all ambient noise - which I disliked, it being too close to tinnitus. The ones I wear are more focussed.
There are also different styles for the little silicon domes that fit inside the ear, which can affect both hearing and comfort. You need to be quite attentive to cleaning them (you should have a little kit supplied with the aid).
And be very careful fitting and removing masks. I have just had a close call. Fasten behind the head masks weren't better for me because they still got mixed up with the small plastic bit you pull the h/aid out by.
I wonder if your aids need tweaking @piglet to change the boost you get from different frequencies. Certainly worth seeing what the NHS audiologist comes up with.
@Piglet I stress at my (NHS) appointments that I have to have confidential conversations with people in noisy surroundings and, apart from one time where they made a mistake in the settings which they fixed quickly, I've always found the aids do help clarify speech as opposed to background sounds. Be insistent!
Having an annoying version of hearing loss where severe loss is one part of the spectrum and normal is another, with noise erupting with amplification of sound, today's test shows I'm to trial a $6200 device. Perhaps in some places these things are funded? Seems unfortunate.
Mr Lamb had them linked that way for volume control. That was great when it worked--but he had an Android phone and the app had been developed for iPhone, so we had issues™.
The one I'm to try for a month has many settings controlled via a cell phone app. Different settings for different environs. It's supposed to know and make some decisions as well. I'm quite skeptical.
My wife had a viral infection in one of her inner ears several years ago. She totally lost her hearing on her left side. Normal amplification devices would not do anything for her. She opted for a cochlear device which is a post inserted directly into the skull bone. An amplification device is attached to the post. It has enabled her to continue to participate in choir and acting.
The only downside is the amplification device does wear out and she has to get it replaced every few years.
It's amazing the difference cochlear implants can make for some people. There was a man at church who had one fitted and it added so much joy to his life.
Comments
In movie theaters (what's a movie theater? I haven't been in one since March) I simply take the hearing aids out and put my earplugs in.
I have also suggested that I start the new ones at a lower setting and gradually increase the volume because the sound level was too high and left me very distressed and shaken. An audiologist I consulted years ago said there was a very narrow band between what I could hear and what I could bear.
I have an appointment just before Christmas and hope they have all the bits by then, so I can trial another pair.
The first hearing aids I bought, on recommendation from a friend, were not adjustable for dining mode, party mode, etc. The volume controls were tiny buttons located on the aids themselves -- you had to press the buttons to raise or lower the sound. The first time I dined out in a restaurant, the sound of dishes and silverware clanging into each other from the kitchen drove me bonkers! After about a week, I took the aids back to the dealer and received a full refund, no questions asked.
My present aids (from another dealer) are adjustable via a remote control device. Also via an app on my phone, although it doesn't work well. Much better. Still, I see that other people have aids with bluetooth capability so that they can directly interface with phone, computer, and (I would imagine) loop systems in churches, etc. This feature would be nice to have, but I can live without it.
I do find that when playing the piano I have to shut the aids off, as they make the piano sound tinny and out of tune. This despite there being a "music" setting that really doesn't help much.
I have asked to explore other settings when I go back to the audiologist, but I may put that off while I get used to the basics as I don't want to be overwhelmed as I was the other day, It definitely rocked my confidence in the audiology practice I use and in my ability to communicate what I need. I felt like a doddery old lady.
So the situation now is that I have another appointment 2 days before Christmas. They will have alternative hearing aids available then* and I will then trial them.
Apart from the loop issue, the problem is that technology has improved so much in the last 6 years in both volume and clarity that I find it overwhelming - one audiologist I consulted years ago said that there wasn't a big difference between what I could hear and what I could bear. I currently have my current aids set at their loudest setting to try to widen that range.
*subject to them being in the country, but that is outside our control.
GI, thanks for your comment. I am, in the words of the late shipmate Uncle Pete, a techno-peasant, so will probably do something similar to what you suggest. The practice runs a drop-in clinic so if I get really stuck I can pop in for help without an appointment - luckily it's on my bus route too.
I do want to say that this clinic has always been first class as far as I and other people to whom I have referred to it are concerned. A, the audiologist I have consulted in the past was unwell so I saw a woman who is trained, but lacks the level of experience (I don't think anyone in the South Island, possibly in the whole country has J's level of experience and expertise.) She is also very approachable and willing to go the extra mile for people.
Amen to that
In the meantime I have made it clear that I am a technopeasant, so a gradual approach would be helpful.
Of course, Murphy's Law holds - this is the day that various trades people have descended en mass to fix things on the house next door. 🙄
Miss Amanda - thanks for mentioning the party option. I now have it installed on a trial basis.
I went today and she'd just booked me in for a lets give your aids a minor tweak session. The audiologist got off on the wrong foot when she suggested that maybe I hadn't put batteries in the new aids. Things went downhill after that and no amount of her fiddling with the new aids could make her sound anything other than she was in a tin box on a distant planet. She's going to book me a longer appointment to try and get them sorted. When I do go I'm taking my husband as one, he is my reference for how well I can hear things and two, he is very good at calming me down when I start getting stroppy!
I hate it when people you deal with assume you're a blathering idiot.
I'm beginning to get used to them, although I'm not as impressed as I'd hoped.
Then, yesterday I heard from my sister that an appointment has been sent to me at her address (where I was living until recently) for NHS audiology on 1st March.
Now why did that have to happen after I'd spent ££££s on them?
The Boots ones are still "on approval", although I've paid for them, so I suppose it's possible I could get get my money back if the NHS comes up with something better.
Nor is it the worst thing in the world to have spare aids.
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2021/02/16/hearing-aids-could-delay-dementia-five-years-study-suggests/[url="http://"][/url]
You may have to register but I think one article or two a week is free?
Firstly because I can't adequately hear Mr F, the TV, the doorbell or the phone without them. And secondly the research that reports the loss of capacity in the brain to process sounds to which it is not exposed. I want to keep the spectrum of what I can hear as broad as possible as long as possible.
This is why I wear my hearing aids when home alone - also to tune into the various birds that yell at each other in my section. I think Aroha (cat) has become more vocal too, or maybe she was but I just didn't hear her. I also find that if I wear them most of the time, my hearing is better when I'm not wearing them. I know that sound weird, but apparently I am not imagining this --- it's something about the brain being more tuned to sound.
I keep finding out new things too - like the difference in the tyre noise between a car driving down a wet road and a dry road and the sounds of the various waterfowl on the river and gulls flying overhead. I can't think of anything I have bought that has given me so much pleasure as my current hearing aids.
I never put my hearing aids in before I have my morning shower though because of horror stories from a woman with whom I once worked. Her father had walked into the shower so many times with his aids in place that the insurance company refused to cover any more of them. (Just in case I always stick my fingers in my ears to check before I get into the shower - yes- I am that paranoid and my new aids are so small I am less aware of having them in my ears).
I haven't worn mine for over a year - since the pandemic started, and socialising stopped. I only really need them when meeting people in groups. Mine are standard NHS ones though, and a bit bulky - when at home I wear blue tooth headphones to listen to the radio/television a lot of the time. Wearing them with hearing aids would I think be uncomfortable.
I've read what @Firenze and @Huia said though. I don't like the thought that I may be going more deaf through not wearing the hearing aids
I find I can't hear the TV without them. As for the telephone, I usually put the phone on speaker. Unfortunately my aids do not include bluetooth -- the next pair will for sure.
I play my (digital) piano through headphones, and so the mics in the hearing aids do not pick up the sound and the piano sounds natural. If I play through speakers, or if I play an acoustic piano, I have to turn the aids off as they make the piano sound tinny.
I'm also still not convinced that the difference they make is justifying the expense; the floorboards in my flat are creaking fortissimo, and the birds are singing, but it seems to me that they amplify everything except the human voice, which is un fat lot de bon.
When I first got hearing aids I gradually increased the time I wore them, then the volume was turned up so I had a more gradual introduction.
I'm going back sometime in mid-March to get these ones turned up.
There are also different styles for the little silicon domes that fit inside the ear, which can affect both hearing and comfort. You need to be quite attentive to cleaning them (you should have a little kit supplied with the aid).
Do you mean the hearing aids act as bluetooth headphones?
The only downside is the amplification device does wear out and she has to get it replaced every few years.