How can you be sure your audiologist is knowledgeable?

Audiologists and Hearing Aid Dispensers
#1

I just wonder…when you go to a general HA clinic to have your new HA adjusted, how can you be shure you got the optimal setup? I mean, the audiologists have to be able to support all the different products and their appropriate SW and so on.
I happen to know that these SW setups programs have several hearing profiles for different type of hearing impairment and purposes. But I have never been informed or asked to try out any of this. I suspect most leave with the “standard” auto-setup based on your audiogram. It’s easy and quick and in many cases of course perfectly ok.
But my experience is that when I went to the audiologists at the HA products main office, in my case Signia, the were willing to discuss and had the knowledge to tweak the programming to optimize it for my purpose. After all they should know their own products.

I there some general truth in this?

#2

Even going to an expert on the aids you wear, that expert relies on you the patient to explain your needs and what you hear a long with the environments you have to deal with

2 Likes
#3

You do the same thing and have the same issues when you go to a general car mechanic. That’s life.

Hearing is an extremely complex physiological and psychological process.

Is it surprising that devices and methods for treating “broken hearing” are similarly complex?

2 Likes
#4

My take is that the real “expert” is somebody that will work with you to meet your needs, but not cave to your every whim and ask you to give things some time. I think an excellent fitting experience more likely has more to do with fitter’s personality than intelligence or knowledge level. Somebody who is willing to work with you and not afraid to ask for help can accomplish a lot.

7 Likes
#5

FWIW, I think this is exactly right. Fitting a complex, modern hearing aid optimally is a slow dance between you and your audiologist/specialist fitter.

:white_check_mark::+1:t2:

1 Like
#6

You’re right about that of course.
But if it’s down to personality and time more than knowledge, then perhaps I myself would be the perfect fitter. In my profession I’m certainly familiar with SW/HW work. Would be really interesting to set up this privately, if it was possible to buy the necessary equipment.

#7

I was fitted with aids last year by one audiologist, had me spare aids checked by a second, and a third fitted my replacement aid.

I trust my first audiologist as she got the aids fitted, programmed, and sends me additional spares when asked. She also provided the TV Connector. The last audiologist was not familiar with the TV Connector and was unable to assist in getting the new aid recognised by the App. I trust the first.

The best was the audiologist who checked my hearing for the reserve aids. He had the advantage that I was in his premises and I was in a sound booth for the test. It was the usual press the button when you hear the tone. Unusually, and the first time in over 30 years, he did a second test with me seeing when the tone was generated.

During blind tests I have often pressed the button when I thought I heard the tone. With a seeing test it removes that imaginary press. I think it was the best test to date.

1 Like
#8

Interesting! Maybe a good idea when you think about it.

#9

This is not standard practice. It eliminates the presses that you made when there clearly wasn’t a sound. It won’t eliminate presses when you think you might hear something aided by seeing the fitter push the button. There are other techniques to assure better reliability, such as a double tone instead of a single tone.

#10

Yes - of course it’s possible. Just check out the Self-Fitting category of this Forum. Lots of members self-program with excellent results, judging from their posts.

#11

Eight audiologist in 3-1/2 years. Hard to build a relationship.
Last one, the one I see now is the best of them. Problem is i do not know how long she will be there.
I have RSHL.
She is the first one to acknowledge it.
She knows now to make the adjustments to allow for it.

#12

Well, Dr. Cliff Olson, the famous audiologist YouTuber, has started a “Best Practice Pro Network” which comprises audiologists who agree to his standards.

Does anyone have any experience with audiologists from his network?

#13

Best? What qualifies as best? How often does your Audi check out your aids? Do they schedule checks on a regular basis or expect you to call them?
For my State supplied aids I have to contact them; it seems like an imposition. For my privately funded glasses they (same franchise) contact me every year.
My Audi fitted my aids 10 months ago, but other than supplying new receivers when I reported a problem, smaller buds (ditto), or retainers when I learnt about them here, zilch.
Put it another way, with 240 days in a year, half a day for a new customer, how many people can one Audi handle?

1 Like
#14

To me it is how patient and knowledgeable my Audiologist is. And how often I can make appointments when needed. Also, how well my Audiologist listens to my suggestions, my likes, and my dislikes. Oh, and never talks down to me.

2 Likes
#15

When I had 2 aids I had the devils own time trying to get the Aud to adjust my aids so they were suitable to my loss.
They didn’t listen to what I was saying.
I had a SSHL in my right ear 6 months later, and far too late to do anything about it. I had to yell and thump the desk to get the Aud to listen to me.

Just because you see a piece of paper for the qualifications on the wall in the office doesn’t mean they are knowledgable at all. It’s the skills of listening, skills of caring, and the skills of doing the best they can for you and what you are describing. At the end of the session if you can hear a noticeable difference you have a caring Aud.

4 Likes
#16

I honestly don’t know how to determine if an Audiologist is good or not. I suppose it all boils down to how you feel about them after you leave the office. An Audiologist might be very good at fitting for a certain kind of loss, but lousy at fitting other kinds of loss. So, there will be people who will say they are excellent, and those who say otherwise. My own problem seems to be very difficult to properly fit, even though it doesn’t look that way from my audiogram. This has resulted in my not wearing aids, even though I have seen several Audiologists. Out of all, the only one I trusted did not fit me for aids. She told me that aids wouldn’t really help me very much.

#17

Looking at your loss John and the statement above - that sounds like massive confirmation bias; and you’ve just found someone that supports your opinion.

Your loss is aidable, and there should be significant long term advantages to wearing HA for you.

I think it’s massively unfair to introduce it in a debate about competence. You can be seen by the best Doctor in the World, but if you’re not willing to engage with their solution; it doesn’t make them less competent.

You might want to get that river in Egypt out of your head.

2 Likes
#18

I really don’t know on this one. I’ve had similar feelings about John and have followed his comments on the forum for a number of years. His situation seems unusual. I agree that the patient has to be willing to engage (and from what I’ve heard, he has, up to a point) On the flip side, the medical provider needs to take the patient where they’re at and try to help them. I’ve been humbled several times in my career where stuff I “knew” ended up being wrong.

1 Like
#20

You might try reading this thread.
Could be helpful.

#21

Are you able to remove the molds from the receiver? If so
Fit the Brio domes to the KS10 receivers, you’ll need your audiologist to reprogram them if you do.

Don’t forget to post your audiogram it’ll help everyone with advice.

Yeah quite common for most people, something that you’ll need to get used to over time ( weeks/months sometimes longer) it’s called the occlusion effect.

Well it didn’t seem to be a problem with the Brio2, this off course is because you were using open domes.

What size vent are you using on your molds? Depending on your audiogram you’d want a larger size.

There’s no doubt you need some more adjustments done to get them “just right” soft sounds need to be a bit lower, possibly across all frequencies as well, discuss this with your audiologist.

Yep I never liked this, I never got used to AutoSense, I gave up on Phonak as my “main” go to HAs for this reason.

Yep so true for a lot people, including myself,unfortunately it’s not the holy grail of fitting. Works for some and not for others.

Absolutely! Welcome to DIY, you can do your own personal programming right at home, at your convenience, it’s easily enough, plenty of people from right here on hearingtracker to help you along with this.

Sure of course they can, it just takes a bit of patience, just got to spend the time setting them set up, to find that sweet spot!

1 Like