ideas and tips for better speech understanding. i use oticon intent 1, (100 receiver)
I would like to exchange ideas for those who have a hearing loss similar to mine. Regardless of the brand of hearing aid, I would like to exchange ideas and tips on how to improve speech understanding in difficult situations, such as:
in a restaurant.
in a car while traveling.
in church.
speaking softly next to the ear.
when people speak to us from behind or to the side.
Your audiogram is lower than 60 dB. So outer hair cells in your cochleas are died, and you cannot hear most of sound nuances as frequencies difference or separate sounds in noise. I have similar hearing loss, and I use lip reading as first method in all situations.
ok. but in car is complex.
I’ll try with the connectclip. I’ll hang it on the seat facing backwards. Let’s see if it works, see what the people in the back say.
Generally, there are a lot of communication tips available. I teach a class on this at UNF in the continuing education program. So too much to provide all of it here. Here are a few tips:
For restaurants, go when it is less busy or find a quieter restaurant if you can - look for carpets, tablecloths, anything to absorb sound. Choose a table in a quiet area, not near a bar or kitchen. Booths help, center tables are the worst. Sit in middle of table with either your back to a wall or I sit with my back to noise, as I can use directional mics in hearing aids and in my Roger On table mic mode to minimize that direction. In a very large group I sit close to those I want to hear and don’t try to hear everyone. The Roger mic helps, but it is for Phonak hearing aids, or other hearing aids with the use of a MyLink neck loop.
I hope this helps.
For church ask for the ministers and any speakers to use your Connectclip, and sit as close as you can. If the church is very large you could ask for an Assistive Listening System such loop, or FM.
For soft speakers, ask your audi to add a program for soft speakers, also consider using the Connectclip.