Your help please, my husband (profound hearing loss) finally got new hearing aids, but because he needs a life tube and dome fitting for 1 ear he’s ended up with 2 different hearing aids an Exceed SP and Engage P which can’t be paired. The Engage P is not as good so although his hearing is better in 1 ear its let down by the need for 2 different aids.
Does any one know a way to fit a lifetube to an Xceed SP?
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Ask the hospital for 2 x Xceed SP or 2 x Engage P. The fitting range between the 2, Engage P and Xceed SP is 5 dB only.
That way the Aids will work together.
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Lifetube won’t work with a profound loss.
You would just end up with crazy feedback. There’s a reason why he was given an ear mould, unfortunately.
Even if you did buy a Lifttube, the whole hearing aid would have to reprogrammed to work with a Lifetube even tho he’s well out of the range for wearing a Lifetube with a profound loss.
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Thank you for your replies. Apologies if this is a silly question, he is using a life tube for the EngageP because they couldn’t make the Xceed SP work for him in that ear.
His previous aid (right ear) had the vent in the mould very slightly enlarged because of the same issue with the right ear. Is there no way that would work now with the Xceed?
Or could it be that they just haven’t got the mould right?
I’m just trying to find ways to make this easier for him … and for my sanity! he’s come such a long way having been hospitalised with covid last year and not expected to recover, thankfully he did.
Occulsion is the issue. I’m not very good with Oticon but I’ll tag @Volusiano who maybe able to help?
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I looked at the Oticon Genie 2 programming software and although I see the Oticon Xceed BTE SP there, I just don’t see the Engage in the menu option at all. I have no idea which Oticon programming software would support the Engage, but apparently Genie 2 2023.1 (the latest version) does not support it. It supports the Real, More, Play PX, Own, Zircon, Xceed, Zceed Play, OPN S, OPN Play, Ruby, OPN, and Siya, but not the Engage.
Even if Genie 2 2023.1 does support the Engage, all hearing aids models can only be programmed with the same model on both Left and Right aid. They cannot be mixed. If you mix them up, then they must be programmed individually and separately as 2 single aids, not as a pair.
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Oticon Engage is programmed with same software as Oticon Xceed.
Engage is just a NHS Aid altho the Xceed is as well. Engage is locked, Xceed is not.
Question was how to solve Occlusion.
Engage based on Opn tech and Xceed based on Opn S tech.
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OK, thanks for the clarification. The information the way it’s presented is very sparse and vague and incomplete, so I didn’t even pick up that the question is about occlusion, but I’m glad you picked that up.
I’m not sure how I can help anyway because occlusion is a fitting issue and I’m more familiar with the programming parameters in Genie 2. It sounds like the OP’s husband has profound loss, so I agree that there’s really no way to work around occlusion if a custom mold is needed to prevent feedback.
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In Phonak Target there’s a feature to help with occlusion.
Wondered if Genie has the same? @Volusiano
It does seem strange that @user1116 husband has 2 different hearing aids of different tech level especially there’s only 5 dB difference on fitting range between the two Aids.
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I’m not aware of anything in the Oticon Genie 2 designed to help with occlusion software-wise. I believe that the Phonak Target Occlusion Compensation involves lowering the gains in the low frequencies to help with what @Neville called the “ampclusion” effect, right? Because real occlusion is probably relieved most effectively by venting only. Or I guess another way is like with the Signia’s Own Voice feature.
But if the OP’s husband’s low frequency hearing loss is profound enough, I wonder if occlusion can really be such a big issue after all? Normally I think people with good (enough) low frequency hearing would be more affected by occlusion than people with profound low frequency hearing loss. But with no audiogram information available for the OP’s husband, we can’t really tell if occlusion would be a significant issue for him or not.
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Thank you all for trying to help me, sorry I don’t know enough to explain it properly. Here is my husbands audiogram
The hearing loss is pretty much identical in each ear, not completely identical but near enough.
Even more unusual that he has odd hearing ads.
His lows are better which is why he has occlusion.
That hearing loss would fit both a Xceed SP or UP.
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I would ask for the same hearing aids and then he’ll get Bluetooth in both ears, not just one.
The Xceed SP fitting range is 20 dB to 110 dB.
The Xceed UP is 20 dB to 120 dB.
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Thank you but that’s the problem. The audiologist tried both ears with Xceed and couldn’t make the right ear work without the occurence (if that’s the name for when it sounds like you have your finger in your ear and its really echoes). They tried programing but appently couldn’t fi it so swapped it for the Engage P with life tube.
I was hoping to find a way to make the Xceed work for both his ears.
Was he using ear moulds?
If so, ear moulds would have to have vent size increased. That may take time depending if ear moulds have to be sent off to have vents increased/made bigger.
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Yes.
my husband said the same that the vent needs to be made bigger and the audiologist said no it won’t help.
I can see why there would be more occlusion felt on the right ear compared to the left ear, because the low frequency hearing loss is slightly better (less loss) in the right ear compared to the left ear. But I agree with @Zebras as to why they can’t just simply open up the vent size on the right ear mold a little bit bigger, rather than resorting to refit him with the Engage, which can create more complications than it solves.
Usually the simplest approach without having to redo a new mold each time to increase the vent size is to have a bigger vent in the custom mold, but downsize that vent opening with a plastic plug that has a smaller vent hole inside of it. If that creates too much occlusion, then the next plastic plug with a slightly bigger vent hole inside of it would replace the original plug. And so on until there is no more option but to remove the plastic plug altogether to get that biggest vent size. That’s how my custom mold was outfitted, with the biggest vent hole, and my HCP gave me about 3 or 4 plugs with various vent hole sizes inside of them to experiment.
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I wonder how the audi would know that it won’t help without actually trying? Sounds like the audi simply doesn’t want to go through the trouble of redoing a new mold each time for different vent sizes, hence the life tube on the Engage. The approach with using a plastic plug with different internal vent hole sizes like I mentioned above would allow the use of the same mold while varying vent sizes. Then at least the audi can prove quickly to you whether it would really help or not.
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Thank you and @Zebras I’ve just been reading this out to my husband. He drilled a hole in the mold with his old hearing aid, to make it work when he first got them. I’m so pleased that your solution is exactly what he thought was the answer. its just that the NHS Audiologist convinced him it wouldn’t work.
He asked if you know what size the vent was in the ones you are refering to and he will try this out.