Pretty new to the world of hearing aids and have been lurking around on this forum for a while. (If I hadn’t dragged my feet I really should have had a couple of years experience by now…)
Have only tried one pair, late last year, which was Phonak Infinio Spheres but gave them up because they were, literally, painfully bulky. (Might have worked if they were on their own behind the ears but they needed to compete with my different pairs of glasses that I switch a gazillion times a day.)
Now trying to reboot my search for HA:s and decided to come here for advice. The reason is that I’m actually in the search for two pairs. At work, Bluetooth, Wi-Fi and similar connectivity is a no-no. Out of work though I would prefer all the “bells and whistles”.
My audi recommended that I’d try to stick to the same brand though. The reason being that it would be easier for the brain to adapt if the “sound image” between the sets would be as similar as possible. (We’ll see if the audi can come up with a decent suggestion.)
Anyone here who’s been in the same situation, i.e. starting out with two sets from scratch? Or even just having the same work/out-of-work needs? If so - any recommended combinations?
Living in Sweden and we’ve got the major brands like Phonak, Oticon, GN Resound, Signia, Widex, Starkey available as far as I know of. Maybe others as well but haven’t seen much of “over-the-counter”.
Don’t have any real preferences regarding type/style. Seems to me though that it would be easier to handle RIE/RIC rather than CIC/IIC but then again - are there any non-bluetooth RICs anymore?
For the out-of-work pair all features would be nice to have but sound is the most important. I.e. true native hands-free would be wonderful but not a necessity (I prefer Android phones so a bit chastened already) and so on.
Unfortunately I don’t have an audiogram to upload but as far as I understood it after the test was that my hearing loss wasn’t too severe (“moderate”?) and that it was mostly higher frequencies that were affected. My personal experience is that I mostly have problems with conversations, especially when there’s a lot of other people talking in the room or when the speech gets distorted (e.g. by echoing in a stairwell).
I have been retired for about 11 years so I have no reference for the no connectivity at work, but I do understand secret issues. I worked for a company that sent me to a government agency to work on their servers and they would not let me in even with my top secret clearance because I wore aids, and my aids at that time didn’t have any connectivity. I explained that without my aids i couldn’t do the job. I explained that my aids didn’t communicate to anything other than each other, they at first refused my entry. It took my company and boss about 72 hours to get me cleared, once in the server room I fixed their issue in 15 minutes, but tje agency still got charged for my whole time there. Also most hearing aids with connectivity can be put in air plane mode that disables Bluetooth. I have been on planes and none required me to place my aids in airplane mode. I have been in courtrooms that didn’t allow cell phones or smartwatches but they never said a word about my aids.
I got approval to go into controlled space last year for my HAs. Then I added another device and they haven’t answered my request for the new medical gizmo. The approval for the HAs was straight forward and only conditioned on me putting them in airplane mode before going in. I’’ve added that to the dance I do before I go in to check for things that need to stay out. The forms used for this had spaces for extremely high security facilities. I was a bit surprised they had it all out on the form. Different approvals, but there it was. I know of multiple agencies allowing it, but they all use different form and processes. The approval authorities go back to the same lists, however. One of the secret squirrel shops gives the advice and then the local security authorities don’t feel like they are sticking their necks out.
I am not in the same situation - but yes I actually use two (OTC) hearing “aids” - one with no wireless connectivity and the others when I want to stream, use hands-free phone etc,
You say your hearing loss is “moderate” so they could work for you if Eargo’s are available in Sweden. I like them because they are virtually invisible and they work well for me different settings with a Soundmatch program (based on your audiogram) for different environments (normal, meeting, restaurant etc) and the ability to adjust the noise filter, emphasize speech etc within each setting. The charging case does have Bluetooth connectivity so you would have to leave that behind - but they are rated for 17 hours on each charge (which seems accurate based on my experience). Wearing them I really have no need to stream in most cases. I can join video / phone calls using the device speakers, listen to TV through my 5.1 system, take calls in the car using the car audio system.
When I want to stream or go hands-free I use Airpods Pro 2’s. Here in the US they are now approved as over the counter hearing aids (not sure if that is the case in Sweden) and you can either use an Apple Hearing Test to set them up or load an audiogram from another source. They also work great for flying etc where you can put them into transparent mode (to speak to aircrew etc) or noise cancelling mode to listen to music or other audio.
The downside of course with the Airpods is it is very obvious you are wearing them (and some may think you are not paying attention to them) and they have short battery life.
Anyway Eargo 7’s (if available in Sweden) may solve the issue of finding hearing aids without any wireless connectivity for work. Then you could select the best hearing aids for you for outside work.
Hi. so very different approach, but have you considered the Lyric hearing aids? they are an ongoing cost and may not be suitable for your hearing loss, but they are incredibly discrete and they have no connectivity requirements at all. Now that would mean you wore the same set all the time, you don’t take them out, but if they work for you, you’d not really have to think about them again and work would have no issues with them. Worth looking into at least I’d say
Rather than different two different models, what about having two aids of the same model and have your audiologist disable the connectivity on one of them? Would your workplace accept that?
Otherwise maybe look for an older main brand and their sister low end brand equivalent (although even these increasingly include connectivity these days)?
If a model was listed as unacceptable for my workplace, nothing like that would matter. There is Unacceptable, Acceptable with asterisk (comment like disable BT while in controlled space) and just plain Acceptable. Most security managers aren’t going to be willing to negotiate any way around that.
I remember a time back some years where we had piles (as in whole pallets) of hard drives which had been contaminated with one or another kind of data. Yet we bought more and more, and paid to have the “bad” ones shipped for destruction. I showed the security manager a paper where the drives had a self erase where no one would ever be able to recover the data after the erasure. Even remaining in our custody for eventual destruction but being reused in the meantime could not be entertained in the least.
Thanks for the info on Eargos. Unfortunately I don’t think they are available over here. The only info I can find (in Sweden) are articles in various news-sources, mostly about the models being released. Unless they are sold under som other name here as “Eargo” as a product name seems to be used in Sweden by a different company - selling earplugs (!).
Hadn’t heard about them but they sound interesting. Looks like only a select few Phonak dealers have them here though.
One con would be swimming though. I think it would be difficult to completely change my style of swimming and keeping the ears above surface.
And wouldn’t they mess up the only good thing about my hearing-loss, i.e. being able to have long sleep-ins on weekends even though the next door neighbours kids wake up early.
This actually sounds ideal if it is technically possible. Haven’t looked insid a pair of HAs but I reckon it is not for everyone with a soldering iron to do.
Not sure how they would fit/program them afterwards though… Isn’t that normally done over BT when available?
Hi. I’ve been swimming with the Lyrics. If your head is under water a lot of the time then you can shove ear plugs in. The Lyrics go so deep that you can get earplugs in there. You can also get swim plugs which let you hear a bit through the plugs. AS for sleep ins, turn them off at night if you don’t want them on. You can do that. Then it’s like you’re wearing ear plugs. They also have a sleep mode where everything is just very quiet, no amplification happens. I honestly think you should give them a try. It might be the simplest solution for you. Also in terms of audiofile listening, they have very pure sound because they’re analogue. That might not suit your type of hearing loss at all but nothing ventured, nothing gained as they say
