I thought it isn’t helpful in some situations because I had to work hard. Then the battery died. Then I’ve realised how much it really helped. Yes, I had to work hard but without it, battle was just lost.
In short - turn it off and see if its helping if you haven’t done that already. I was really surprised.
About crosses…
I have one bad ear and one normal ear. First few years I wore aid only on bad ear. People talking from my bad side had to walk over to my normal side.
This year I’ve started with 2 aids, and results are awesome. Paradises 90.
The other day, shopping mall, echoey, slow day so no many people around, my husband on my bad side, wearing mask and speaking normally, we could normally converse. No mics needed.
Paradises and marvels transfer sounds between the aids in various modes. Not loud, but it’s there.
There’s also 360 mode which I’m currently looking into which should maybe be louder.
So basically I’m utilising all 4 mics.
Prior to this, fitters would use acoustic phone program and tweak it for everyday usage. Such solution is called amp cross or tricross.
So it aids bad ear AND transfers the signal to good ear (and aids it if needed).
For phonak, there’s this 360 program that should work better since you don’t have to pick side master-slave, it should detect automatically from which to which it should transfer.
Regular cross solutions just pick sounds from bad side, discarding it completely.
Check dr cliff’s video on the topic of single sided deafness / ampcross, forgot the exact title.
However if you’re totally deaf on bad side, then bicross is the term you need.
Cross only transfers the sound to the normal ear from bad side.
Bicross transfers to the good ear and helps it as well (so it’s also an aid).
Those two are devices under such name.
Ampcross solution (no device exists) is with 2 aids, aiding each ear and transferring the signal between them. Needs a fitter who knows how to make it work, and aids that aloow it.