Is the Roger Select or the Roger Pen better for loud workplaces?

Assistive Listening Devices
#1

Tl;dr
Would a Roger Pen strapped to my chest/side/shoulder or a Roger Select on a lanyard/horizontally on my shoulder be more effective for a loud workplace (paired with Roger Focuses)

Background: No hearing loss, possible auditory processing disorder (regardless, I can’t understand speech in noise)

So I’m taking the leap and getting a Roger Focus to help me hear as I’m absolutely miserable every day not being able to hear the people around me.

I was deadset on getting a Roger Pen as my go-to mic and just strapping it to my shoulder or something (turning it on when I’m interacting with people) but now I’m wondering if the Roger Select would be better for my situation (or if I should get both?)

I work in a fast food restaurant currently with LOTS of constant background noise (if it’s not loud customers, it’s the constant whirring of the machines). Anyone have experience using both?

Edit: I have had an audiogram before but it clearly showed that I have no loss. I unfortunately never received the report from the audiologist (I felt it wasn’t necessary to follow up with them considering the results) so I can’t share the results with you all, sorry!

#2

I’m not sure that either are going to do great. The Pen should be pointed at the speaker for best effect and the Select should be placed on a flat surface for the microphones to focus on the direction of speech. Used as described, I think both will do a better job of picking up your speech than your customer’s. I’m thinking the Pen on some sort of a stand that would allow it to be pointed would be best. The Select sitting on the counter might also work.

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#3

As was said above I have my doubts you will get the result you want in this situation you work in. I have both a pen and a Select. I am very pleased with them when I use them the way they were intended to be used, The pen works best when it is on a lanyard around the speakers neck so that the mic is within 8" of the speaker’s mouth. This of course is not practical in a fast food restaurant. The Select may be of more help when you are on counter duty as you can sit it in front of you but not while you are moving around. The Select also comes with a lanyard like the pen does. Another downside with both devices is that when they are working, the mics in your hearing devices are turned down so they are not picking up as much ambient noise. So if a associate comes up beside you to talk to you you will not hear them as well as when the pen or Select is not in use. When I’m in a restaurant with my wife and she has the lanyard around her neck, I hear her fine in the noise but have real difficulty with our server speaking.
Sorry to be a bad news bear but you should consider getting employment is an environment more amenable to your disability - or do a trial with the new Oticon More hearing aids to see how they work for you.

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#4

Ah I should have added more about the Pen. I was going to leave it on standby mode and rely on my ears to hear everyone, then switch it on quickly if I can’t hear them and point it towards the customer (I’ve been thinking of ways to alter my uniform so I can easily detach and reattach the Pen)

Would this work better? The mic would end up being closer to the customer/coworker than myself

Edit: fixed a typo

#5

I have to move between different stations constantly so I wouldn’t be able to leave either on a stand (and there are so many drunk customers that I wouldn’t be able to do so either way). I’ve heard that some people in my situation benefit from low-grade hearing aids but I highly doubt the audiologist will recommend it (or be able to prescribe it)

#6

I really need a new job haha, but it’s making the change isn’t realistic at the moment unfortunately. Thank you for all the info, it’s really helping me figure out a game plan!

I have normal hearing so I don’t know if the Oticon More will benefit me much (or if I’ll even be able to trial or get a pair due to that) but I’ll look into it more and see what my audiologist says before mentioning it to her!

#7

The reason I mentioned the Oticon More is that with their new technology their hearing in noise ability is apparently leading the pack in the hearing aid industry. However they are also reportedly pretty pricey as new and improved technology usually is.

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#8

I don’t know that one would find any consensus that Oticon More was “leading the pack” in hearing in noise ability.

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#9

You’ve defintely got a challenging situation. I don’t know if workplace accomodations are a possibility or not.

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#10

Why are you even asking about hearing aids?

#11

Mirai - with respect, if you had normal hearing you wouldn’t be making this complaint. Others that work there are coping - it is you that has difficulty hearing in noise. Hopefully you have had or are getting an audiogram done through your audiologist and will have the test results clearly explained. See how your hearing in noise ability stacks up. Then your options and needs will become clearer.
I would think all of us with a hearing disability that reads this blog have real difficulty in hearing in noise.

Another point with the pen I experienced myself at gatherings. The moment you stick the pen up close to the mouth of a stranger they tend to pull away. They don’t know what the pen is and so react. It is fine if you are with family and they know why you are doing this. Since you are with new customers all day you should give some careful thought to this approach.

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#12

OP has mentioned that he has possible Auditory Processing disorder and he has seen an audiologist. Although no audiogram was mentioned, presumably the audiologist did one before the possibility of Auditory Processing disorder was mentioned.

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#13

Yes, this sounds like it could help.

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#14

A user suggested something and I was responding accordingly. I felt that it would be very disrespectful to ask people for their time and advice and not consider their response :slight_smile:

#15

They definitely aren’t. My only options would be to amplify the voices I can’t hear or find a new job, though the latter isn’t available to me for the time being :frowning:

#16

My results showed that I have no hearing loss but the audiologist understood my struggles and suggested that it could be Auditory Processing Disorder (which I will get to confirm in the next few weeks!)

I’m glad you mentioned the Oticon More because I looked into it and I found that many people use low-gain hearing aids for their APD (which may work better than the Roger Focus and Pen!)

I was hoping to casually hold the pen next to the register to be a bit more incognito but I totally agree that it would be pretty confronting for the customers :confused:

#17

Yay, thank you for the help!

#18

Good luck with getting treatment for your disorder. Hope something can be done to solve the problem.

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#19

Thank you so so much for everything!

#20

This can be adjusted to your preference.

Hm, ‘quick’ means a bunch of seconds (I didn’t measure, but think more like 5, not in an instant), I’m not sure that customers will want to wait or understand that they have to wait.

It depends what’s your QuickSIN score, or similar - how much signal to noise ratio you need.
Aids are limited to give a bost of around 9db in ideal conditions, and mics go up to 15.
And low tier aids usually are restricted in how much help they give (in order to have reason to sell the top tier models)

Select definitely catches better, on greater distance than pen.
But leaving select on some desk, I mean, it’s expensive piece of equipment and without a way to chain it down so that it could not be taken away. I wouldn’t dare to use it in such environments.

Definitely find a practice which does proper testing.
Tonal audiogram is useless after a point ‘yeah, you do have frequency loss’.
You then have speech audiogram, which tests how well your brain works with loud and clear inputs. I assume that results would be fine in your case. It can be used also in combination with white noise in te background to see how that goes.
And then you have SNR/SIN tests which clearly measure how well you cope in background noise, when that noise is of complex type, speech babble.

Find a practice that is able to give you all those 4 tests. Then they’ll be able to give you proper advice based on those results.

From a distance, I’d guess, if your SNR isn’t THAT bad, you might get with mid/top tier aids alone, to use them as a noise filtering device, and not as a hearing aid.
Like, phonak marvel/paradise 90 have this stereozoom where two aids work together to focus on sounds in front of you (automatically in model 90, and as a custom program in model 70), when the noise is above given threshold. But for such environment, unchained mics doesn’t seem like a good idea.

Lower marvel/paradise, so 30 and 50 don’t have that stereozoom feature.
Also, if you’re in USA or UK, go to costco and try KS9, that’s basically marvel 90, for price of 1500 usd for a pair.
Select or pen + 2 roger focuses would probably cost more.

But, choosing the device should come AFTER proper testing. Good fitter who knows that all of those tests are useful and for what is worth their price in gold.

And you need someone who really gets it.
Not someone who will tell you that you can’t have a problem because tonal audiogram looks fine, or who isn’t able to tell you your SNR values, because how they can tell you what could help you, if anything?

Yeah, my strongest advice would be to find a new job, but maybe you got ‘lucky’ and your SNR isn’t that bad and some aids can help it. I ain’t lucky, and even mics cannot really help me (but are better than without them).
Since I can’t see how mics could be used in such environment to keep you responsive and keep the device safe.

Also, just wearing aids with not open domes, ideally powerdomes if you can cope with them (or just vented ones), can really help, since you utilize aids for noise removal and you have passive noise cancelling from the fact that your ear canal is closed by the dome.

MAYBE those apple earbuds could help in a same way in their transparency mode?
I’d look into that as well.

There were some other headphones, I think bose hearphones or something called like that? Check through topics in #assistive-listening-devices there might be some useful info for you.

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