New to hearing aids

Hearing Aids
#1

I worked for many years with out wearing hearing protection because I didn’t need it! I am young and invinceable. Well it became a quality of life issue for me I was getting tired of saying “What?” and seeing the frustration of my wife and kids faces and then they would say “Forget it” So I took delivery last Wednesday a pair of Costco Bernafon Chronos 9 Premiums RIC with Soundgate. The soundgate bluetooth I am really not a fan of it will not stream the music from my I-phone, and the phone call hands free quality is so so. But my big question is I hear all the background noise is amplified but I am still having problems with hearing conversation, or hearing the TV. It is very frustrating, before I tried Costco I went to Avada they quoted me $10,000.00, but when I tried the demostration models she had it set up with background noise directly behind me she was talking normal tones 30 feet from me and I could hear clear as a bell. I was told these are one of the best on the market but maybe this lady does not know how to really do the adjustments? Thoughts? I could always hear the background noise and now its amplified, also I hear the ringing in my ears is more noticeable. Help! Also I posted my numbers but have no clue what they mean. Thanks for the help ahead of time.

250
R20 L15
500
R25 L30
1K
R25 L10
2K
R55 L50
4K
R55 L65
8K
R35 L35
SRT
R25 L25
WRS1
R50 L55
Score
R92 L92
MCL
R50 L55
UCL
R90 L95

#2

I’ve had trouble pairing my Streamer which is identical to the Soundgate with anything made by Apple and I have ended up using the patch cord to have a stable audi source from anything made by them. I don’t know if the Iphone has a outlet that will allow the patch cord to be plugged into but if it does it might help. I haven’t had any other problems with any other manufacturer pairing and staying paired to my Streamer.

#3

When I look at your posting what jumps out at me are your numbers at 2K and 4K. They make me wonder what is happening at 1.5K and 6K. You may also have a drop there. A person receives a lot of speech information at those frequencies. Take a minute to Google “speech banana”. It will show you which parts of words (phonemes) are heard at those frequencies.

In my opinion (I’m no expert), you have a more challenging loss to configure. It is not the more commonly seen high frequency ski slope loss. It will take a number of adjustments to get it just right. As I understand it, one must use caution when amplifying the lower frequencies, otherwise the low frequency background noises become too loud and overwhelm speech. It is a delicate balance. It is a good thing that you have a 90 day trial. Try to be patient and keep going back until they get it right. It can be done. Your word recognition scores (WRS) are good. That is a positive sign for potential success.

Also, give your ears a chance to adjust. As you will read on this site, it does take time for your ears to adjust to all the new sounds and begin to sort through them. What is so overwhelming now will get better. Another possibility for hearing speech is the Resound with mini-mic that Costco carries.

I have a low frequency cookie-bite loss and am starting to lose my highs as I age. My numbers also tend to fluctuate depending upon how well my Eustachian tubes are working. This winter has been a real challenge. On days when my hearing is worse I use an assistive listening device (personal fm system) to bring speech to me. Unfortunately I don’t have a volume control on my hearing aid. Next time with the help of the information I have gained on this forum, I will be wiser when selecting hearing aid features.

#4

SRT (Speech Reception Threshold) The lowest hearing threshold that 50% of a presented list of 2-syllable words is correctly identified.

WRS (Word Recognition Score) It indicates how well one can repeat words presented at a comfortable listening level.

MCL (Most Comfortable Loudness Level) The hearing level that one finds most comfortable to listen to speech.

UCL (Uncomfortable Loudness Level) The hearing level that one finds speech uncomfortably, but not painfully, loud.

Your word recognition scores were 92% for both ears at 25db.

#5

It may take several adjustment sessions to get everything worked out and then it may take a couple of months for your brain to learn to sort out the competing sounds. I’ve had about 10 adjustments, some because of issues that needed more this or less that and some sessions just to set up my preferences, as things went along. I have a main program for mostly quiet situations and a party setting for loud background noise.

Wear them all day every day and things will get better faster.

#6

When I get new hearing aids I need a lot of adjustments, once a week at first, esp to reduce background noise. I like my Phonak and the ICOM streams fine with my iphone.