Help for Hearing Impairment

tomitma

Guardsman wrote: »

I'm having a pair of Siemens Impact M fitted in two weeks time,I have never worn hearing aids before so what should I realistically expect from them?
When do I tell the audiologist that they hearing aids are OK when in all honesty I have no idea what the quality of sound should be.
Will I be able to walk around the hospital to try them out in different situations ?

I truly am looking forward to getting them because at the moment I'm missing out on a lot of things and that is my worry that maybe I'm looking forward too much and they will not be what I expected.I hope all this makes sense to somebody out there

I have very bad hearing, I didnt realise how bad it was until I was fitted with hearing aids, I didn't get on with the national health ones, I kept on losing them so I paid for two CIC privately.

They are brilliant, but hearing aids do not make any thing clearer, they just make everything louder, I still watch TV and think to my self " I didn't understand a word that person said" When you are fitted with the hearing aids, they advise you not to wear them to go home, and just to use for a few hours a day until you get used to them.

When I first had my hearing aids, and I wore them whilst driving, I swore blind that there was something wrong with the car, because I heard noises that I had never heard before whilst driving.

Hear-Hear

"hearing aids do not make any thing clearer, they just make everything louder"

That's a bit too much of a generalisation, tomitma. It really depends on the quality of the hearing aid you have. If it is a basic aid, say 1 to 6 channels, then it is likely to amplify too much, as you say. A standard aid, say between 6 and 12 channels, will give a lot more clarity (which is what most peeple need, rather than a lot of volume). A premium hearing aid, say 13 channels and more, will provide a really high level of speech resolution.

Think of it all like pixels on a digital camera. The more you have, ther better the quality/resolution you get !

Great to see that you have a pair of hearing aids, though. A single aid is rarely much use for a bilateral hearing loss. But do bear in mind that CIC aids, although brilliant from a cosmetic angle, are too small to take Directional Microphones, so won't be able to separate speech from noise as effectively as In The Canal or In The Ear aids.

tomitma

Hear-Hear wrote: »

"hearing aids do not make any thing clearer, they just make everything louder"

That's a bit too much of a generalisation, tomitma. It really depends on the quality of the hearing aid you have. If it is a basic aid, say 1 to 6 channels, then it is likely to amplify too much, as you say. A standard aid, say between 6 and 12 channels, will give a lot more clarity (which is what most peeple need, rather than a lot of volume). A premium hearing aid, say 13 channels and more, will provide a really high level of speech resolution.

Think of it all like pixels on a digital camera. The more you have, ther better the quality/resolution you get !

Great to see that you have a pair of hearing aids, though. A single aid is rarely much use for a bilateral hearing loss. But do bear in mind that CIC aids, although brilliant from a cosmetic angle, are too small to take Directional Microphones, so won't be able to separate speech from noise as effectively as In The Canal or In The Ear aids.

Thanks for that

Guardsman

Next question will I need to buy a dry and store box for my new hearing aids ? They seem very expensive for what they are,

sunnyone

Guardsman wrote: »

Next question will I need to buy a dry and store box for my new hearing aids ? They seem very expensive for what they are,

each aid comes in its own box, you clean them with wet wipes and they dry almost instantly due to the alcohol in these wipes.

Guardsman

Sunnyone thank you very much for your prompt informative reply

Hear-Hear

Dry 'n Store. Really good to have, but a bit of a luxury for most people, if truth were told. For others, it's a real necessity, such as:-

1. my granny if her dexterity was poor and I felt she was unable to clean them properly (but she would still have to wipe.brush them daily, at least)

2. my brother if he worked in a warm environment or sweated a lot, as the dry n store is BRILLIANT at drawing out condensation that builds up during day to day use

If you are buying aids privately, have bought mid-range or top-of-range aids, and want to protect some of your investment by extending the longevity of the aids by a year or two, and if you want or need ultra-reliability, then it's worth the cost. For most people, the overnight storage advice given by your audiologist and the thorough cleaning techniques shown in detail at the time of fitting, are more than adequate.

Guardsman

Hear-Hear are you aware of any problems a cyclist would have in wearing a hearing aid ? I'm a regular road cyclist and that is one of the reasons I went for a hearing test was due to the fact I had problems hearing traffic approaching from the rear

Hear-Hear

Guardsman

Modern digital hearing aids are primarily designed to focus on speech from the front of you, and, apart from basic level hearing aids, the better quality hearing aids will actively surpress non-speech sounds (ie. noise) from behind you and to your left and right. In general terms, the higher the quality of your hearing aid, the better any background noise is reduced.

Now this gives you a problem as a cyclist, because wind noise and trafiic noise will be attacked ever more aggresively as you go up the quality range of hearing aids. Exactly the opposite of what you want.

The manufacturers have addressed this issue, though, and on most top-of-range hearing aids, you can instruct your Audiologist to set one of the multi-memory programmes as a 'Sports' or 'Wind' or 'Traffic' programme. Actually, a good Audiologist will recommend this for you without being asked, having listened carefully to you about your listening needs.

Hope this helps.

Guardsman

Hear-Hear That was a great help I'm glad I found this site knowledgeable informative people as yourself are a great help to newbies like me.

The manufacturers have addressed this issue, though, and on most top-of-range hearing aids, you can instruct your Audiologist to set one of the multi-memory programmes as a 'Sports' or 'Wind' or 'Traffic' programme.

Would the Siemens Impact M come under that category?