Resound Omnia vs Phonak Lumity

Hearing Aids
#86

Jordan, the big HA mfrs all pretty much have proprietary fitting formulas. That doesn’t make the best sense generally from what I’ve been able to glean. The tendency is to be a little quieter (more comfortable) and less harsh of the higher freqs, I think. At the cost of speech comprehension.

The (Phonak) target software allows selection from a variety of fitting formulae. I am sure I saw NAL-NA2 for my audeo p90r HAs setup. So, if the proprietary formulae were chosen for each pair of your aids, the matchups are probably not apples to apples comparison ready. If they were each fit to some other (same) formula, then maybe.

WH

#87

Are these phonak marketing folks smoking something? lol, it is another fancy way of saying they do a lot of math to get a first fit.

#88

That is “comfortable” “acceptable” but not necessarily with best hearing in mind.

WH

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#89

Totally agree with your statement. You probably already know this but your statement got me thinking.

Typically people are slow to get hearing aids. As time passes their brain forgets many sounds. When new properly programmed aids are put on these people for their hearing loss it can be very uncomfortable for them. It takes the brain time to relearn the forgotten sounds. Some people are better at it than others. This goes for CI as well.

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#90

So here is a question for the group…

I really like the Phonak Lumity’s. I am hearing speech and the environment so well with these hearing aids that I am reluctant to mess with the settings. Bear in mind that my audiologist set up the Lumity’s with Phonak’s new first fit algorithm.

That being said, I want to give the Resound Omnia’s a second chance. As others have stated, they were probably setup with a different first fit algorithm and I might be doing an unfair comparison between the two platforms. The Omnia’s also have much better battery life which is a big plus.

Here is the question. I have an appointment with my audiologist tomorrow morning. What should I tell him to do with the Omnia’s in order to get a much closer comparison between Lumity and Omnia? Bear in mind I don’t want him messing with the Lumity hearing aids.

Jordan

#91

Hi @JordanK: I would ask him to increase the gain for soft and moderate sounds (that would be 45 and 65 dB for Oticon). Mind you I am not a professional in the area, just a DIYer. That is what I do when I find the hearing aid too quiet.

#92

Ok, my .02 worth. If I found myself in a position that I could hear that well. I would change nothing, and buy the aids just as they are.
Dan

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#93

Correct, I think that the case for most hearing aid users.

I am an native user of hearing aid so i adapt quickly to that kind of hearing aid and it was even easier to transition from HA to CI because I have been wearing hearing aid since the day my parent put me on it when i was a toddler…Each iteration of hearing aid brings improvement to speech understanding in quiet but it didn’t help with noise until I made the decision to move to CI because my asymmetric hearing loss was dragging me down into UP BTE aids on the CI ear. After I got my CI, I had a lot more option now, including resound’s HP RIC hearing aid but i opted for a UP recover for more gain which they recommended it.

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#94

I have tried all the fitting formulas available for my Oticon More 1: VAC+ (Oticon proprietary), NAL-NL1, NAL-NL2, and DSL v5 (adult and pediatric). I find that VAC+ is the best for daily use.

Now, I am not entirely sure that I chose VAC+ because of its algorithm and prescription targets alone. I am going to use an analogy you might be familiar with. Think about computers and their operational systems. MacOS only runs on Apple’s hardware. Windows runs on pretty much any hardware (including Macs until recently). Hence, the MacOS implementation is usually better compared to Windows.

On top of that, 1) there are more ways to tweak the VAC+ formula in Oticon’s fitting software (Genie 2) and 2) a few digital features are not available for the traditional formulas. I guess this should be the same with Phonak and its proprietary fitting formula.

Ideally, if I wanted to compare those two hearing aids, I would have them fitted with traditional fitting formulas and similar gain. That would be a properly designed experiment… for someone doing that kind of research. However, such an experiment is rather pointless for us trying to hear the best we can.

#95

We are all providing subjective results. What would be helpful is objective results from hearing tests with the different formulae. What feels better, or makes me feel like I can hear better, may not actually deliver.

I remember when I came home with the new aids a year ago. I was thinking, “This can’t be right.” The aids were at 100% and I decided to stick with it. It only took a few days for 90% of the discomfort to go away. A week and I was forgetting I had them in. Then months of discovery, asking my wife or someone else around me, “What am I hearing? Oh, the refrigerator/heat/dishwasher/etc.” But I am not naive to think there might be something better. A better fitting formula? A better aid? But convince me with data, not feels good. Reminds me of people diddling with motors in bikes or cars. “I made this change, I can feel it in my butt, it is a lot more powerful.” A dyno answers the question. Butt every change always had the assertion it was successful. In engineering school I was taught that most change less than 10% is usually not discernible. You can measure it with meters and gauges, but usually not reliably feel it. I suspect something like this happens with HAs as well.

Here’s to better hearing!

WH

3 Likes
#96

Measure the output of the Lumity and then match the Omnia to it.

3 Likes
#97

Exactly what @Neville said!!

#98

So I met with my audiologist this morning. I shared with him many of the comments I have posted here comparing the Phonak Lumity hearing aids vs Resound Omnia. As per all of your advice, I asked him to explain how he setup both hearing aids for my trial. I wanted to make sure I was comparing both sets hearing aids with similar initial fit settings, etc. Here is what he said. Hoping this makes sense because I am writing from memory:

  • His preference is to setup hearing aids using the manufacturer’s propriety first fit algorithm.
  • He then does real ear measurements and adjusts the hearing aids to match the DSL v5.0 as closely as possible without negatively affecting compression, etc.
  • He prefers DSL v5.0 vs NAL as he finds his patients don’t like the results with NAL and he ends up doing too much adjusting afterwards.
  • He also prefers to start with the manufacturers initial setting because he believes you get the benefit of their proprietary algorithms, etc.
  • Both my Lumity and Omnia hearing aids were setup like this for all three levels of sound.
  • When you look at the graphs for the output of the two hearing aids, they are similar. What you do see is how each of the manufacturer’s algorithms are adjusting the sound at different levels and different frequencies. Good example was the way Phonak Lumity provides a few db boost in the speech frequencies in quiet environments to help speech sound clearer. This shows up on the graph as a slight increase over the dotted line target level for DSL v5.0.

He played around with the levels on Omnia to more closely match the Phonak Lumity hearing aids and asked me to take both home and continue the trial for a few more weeks. I will let you all know what I think once I have had some time to compare.

Hope I got the explanation down correctly. Let me know what you think.

Jordan

10 Likes
#99

One thing that might make a difference with the Omnia fit is if he doesn’t have you on Experienced Non-Linear for the user settings. It’s been years since I paid close attention to the ReSound settings but the first-fit user setting for ReSound are much more “relaxed,” comfort settings than the Experienced Non-Linear. OTH, if he’s essentially matching output settings as Neville suggested, it’s had to argue with that (although perhaps there are amplitude compression differences in the ReSound first-fit vs. Experienced Non-Linear). Interesting that he prefers DSL5. NAL-NL2 is different from NAL. NAL is usually taken to mean the origina ANL algorithm, which NAL-NL2 superseded. Don, a long-time user here, swore by DSL5 but I found it amplified the highs a little too much for my liking.

1 Like
#100

I put my right lumity trial HA in the charger for about 1 hr to get them back up to 90% and then was going to do the left HA to stream TV ball games tonight … I received a phone call on my Iphone that did not hook to my solo left HA to stream it … I didn’t know that the right HA was needed to stream on phone and TV and then I remembered connecting to my Iphone it says R Phonak hearing aid connected… with my resound HA’s I could stream with L or R HA only

#101

Don was a big help to me and many others here.
His hearing loss was entirely worst than yours though. DSL5 would be better for him than you I would think. Honestly he was probably a CI candidate with very little upper frequency hearing. He worked frequency lowering like a pro.

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#102

How to recognize a Western grad. :wink: Although I did see some more research data supporting DSL over NAL at a recent conference. Another little drop in the bucket.

Sounds like he’s doing a good job.

2 Likes
#103

Another update on Phonak Lumity vs Omnia. I did a sound test using both sets of hearing aids. One test was just listening through the hearing aids using audio speakers and the other was listening through a bluetooth connection directly to the device. I know this test isn’t scientific but it kinda simulates a real world listening situation for the average user.

To do the test I used the following sweeping frequency test video from YouTube:

https://youtu.be/qNf9nzvnd1k

I like this test because it slowing goes form 20 Hz to 20,000 Hz and you can see the exact frequency number, stop it when you start/stop hearing the signal and you can easily go back and double check, etc.

The results will obviously vary by hearing loss but here are my unscientific numbers. This is the range I can actually hear wearing each set of hearing aids:

Phonak Lumity Audeo L90-RT with standard MP receivers and double domes

  • With speakers listening through the hearing aids: 30 Hz - 10,800 Hz
  • With bluetooth streaming to the hearing aids: 30 Hz - 10,000 Hz

Resound Omnia 9 with standard MP receivers and double domes

  • With speakers listening through the hearing aids: 200 Hz - 7,200 Hz
  • With bluetooth streaming to the hearing aids: 150 Hz - 7,200 Hz

I will also say that plugging your ears with your fingers during the test does boost the bass and very slightly improve the results. This is consistent with what we all know about bass leaking out of your ears with open type fittings.

The results kinda show what I have been noticing when listening to music or playing the guitar. The Phonak Lumity’s have a wider frequency range and provide and music sounds quite a bit better. The other thing I want to point out is that when you do this test, you will notice that the volume goes up and down as the frequency generator video clip sweeps through the frequency range. This may be the hearing aids or just my own nerve damage. Just mentioning it because it was interesting.

I would be interested in hearing what other people are observing when doing this test. Like I said at the beginning, its not really very scientific but its still a good way of understanding what you are hearing with a particular type of hearing aid. The test also shows why the Phonak Lumity aids sound better (for me) when I am listening to music or playing music.

Jordan

8 Likes
#104

Thanks for this! I have used pure tones to tweak the music program in my More 1. There are two things I would like to share in case you are not aware of them.

Firstly, the hearing aids may do some sort of digital processing to those tones. When I run tests with pure tones I select the “music program” since they usually have less digital processing going on.

Secondly, our brain does not perceive sound intensity equally across the range. Here is a link if you want to read about it. That might be a reason for you perceiving the volume going up.

#105

I ran the test my self, my hearing is quite severe, I can only hear up to 5 khz and 8 khz on my CI ear… 6 Khz if I am using Oticon dynamo…

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