Upgrade to Oticon Intent after 5 years with Opn

Hearing Aids
,
#1

[Edited to add a 4th question at the end]

I upgraded just a month ago to Oticon Intent 1 hearing aids and want to share my story and pose some questions.

My first hearing aids were the Oticon Opn 1 with disposable batteries. Getting hearing aids was one of the better decisions I’ve made in my life. I hear speech much better and no longer have to expend substantial mental energy to comprehend what people are saying. They fit great from the start and I took full advantage of the streaming and phone connectivity. They were replaced under warranty after about three years when I started hearing the beeping telling me to check the microphones.

Five years later I upgraded to Oticon Intent 1 hearing aids. I am excited to have the latest technology and give up disposable batteries. But just as important is now having two sets of hearing aids. I like having a backup set in case my Intents need to be serviced or I am doing an activity under harsher conditions than I want to expose the Intents to.

Fitting the Intents was frustrating and took some work. The receiver wire seems to be formed into a shape that doesn’t fit my ears well. My audiologist had me try different size wires and earmolds. We almost went back a model and tried the Oticon Real. But in the end, I learned to adjust the shape of the wire and found that the shortest available wire is right for me. Beyond that, the Intents are slightly fatter than the Opns, but this I adjusted to quickly. Overall, after this ordeal, I realized the instantly perfect fit of my first Opn aids was probably luck.

I haven’t had a lot of opportunities to experience the reportedly better speech sound in noise. I will keep listening for that. With the Intent, I have a sound equalizer and streaming equalizer in the app. I’ve played around with these, but don’t seem to need them. Either way, having these is an upgrade over the Opns. Bluetooth connectivity seems no worse than my Opns or maybe a little more stable (I use an iPhone 12 Pro). I have both the standard desktop charger and the smart charger. Tap to answer and end calls is nifty. I miss being able to mute using the button on the device. I can only unmute using the button; muting is now only through the app.

I want to post the following questions to the forum:

1: My audiologist has me using open bass domes with the Intent after using open domes with the Opn. Does it matter?
2: Is there any reason not to exclusively use the smart charger for overnight, plugged-in charging? I like how it has a cover to protect the devices from pets and such.
3: What should I be asking my audiologist to make sure I am taking full advantage of the Intent’s technology?
4: On the iPhone hearing aid interface (not the Oticon app), the default volume is 64 for my Intents. It was 70 for my Opns. The audiogist says the default volume didn’t change, regardless of how the iPhone displays it. Is this right?

1 Like
#2

I have been wearing Oticon aids for 14 years and updated to INTENT1 aids about 6 weeks ago. I wear custom ear molds due to necessity, but I believe your hearing loss should do well with open bass domes, but that will be up to your audiologist and you. Yes the wires on the INTENT aids can be an issue for soom individuals. But I have been totally comfortable with my INTENT1 receiver wires from the beginning. From what I have seen tje power receiver wires are shaped a little different than the receivers that can use domes.
I have the smart charger too. I charge my charger with the aids in it on Sunday night and have the charger unplugged and charging my aids the rest of the week. But pay attention to the leds on the rear of the charger. I get one charge after the charger leds is down to a single led be on.
The key is to explain to your audiologist what is and isn’t working for you. Using the full technology just depends on your hearing loss and likes and dislikes.
I cannot help you with the iPhone as i have the Samsung S23 phone and find it better than the iPhone that i traded for the Samsung S23.

2 Likes
#3

In order to get more opportunities to compare the Intent against the OPN for better speech in noise performance, you’ll probably need to go the more noisy places often, and possibly even bring both pairs with you so you can do A/B comparison on the spot. Otherwise, if you keep looking to compre in this department but you mostly spend your time in simpler environments, you’re probably not going to be able to tell much of a difference, especially because your hearing loss is not too bad compared to many of us on the forum, so I can see that the OPN 1 should have served you well as it has, and the Intent, with all its improvements over the OPN 1, might not give you an obvious improvement for speech in noise unless you’re in very complex an challenging situations often enough.

It’s true that you can’t mute the Intent on the button like you can with the OPN, but you can just down click it to zero volume, which takes a few more click than just the one long kick for Mute in the OPN, but it might still be better than whipping out the phone, opening the app before you can mute.

As for your questions:

  1. The open bass domes basically has a one or two small vents in the dome compared to the much bigger vent in the open dome. It helps retain more of the lower frequency sounds so that the streaming experience might be a little better for you with more bass contained and not leaked out due to the smaller vent(s). As long as you don’t feel any more occluded between the 2 types, and have a better experience with the bass when streaming music, then your HCP has probably done good to switch you over to the open bass dome on the Intent.

  2. If you use the Smart Travel charger every night so that you have a cover to protect the aids from pets, I think it’s OK as long as you don’t ALWAYS plug it in for the charging every night. That’s because Lithium Ion batteries don’t like to be at 100% state of charge all the times. I would use it like how it’s intended, charge it up full, then use it for 3 nights without charging (the manual says that it can provide at least 3 full charges although people have found that it can provide a lot more than 3), then on the fourth night, plug it in while charging, then repeat the cycle and use it without plugging in for the next 3 nights. That way, you keep its battery “exercised” as it’s intended to be exercised, which should help the battery last longer than keeping it charged to full every night.

  3. Ask your HCP if they can do the Audible Contrast Threshold test or not. It’s a new thing that came out last November, and while not all audiometers are compatible with it yet. But it doesn’t hurt to just ask. If you HCP can do the ACT test, it should take just a few minutes to get done, and the result can be fed into the Oticon Genie 2 programming software so that the noise suppression value can be more accurately set for you.

The Real and the Intent have Sudden Sound Stabilizer and Wind and Handling Stabilizer. You can ask him or her to turn them ON for you if you want to take advantage of them. I don’t see why not have them ON. The Sudden Sound Stabilizer has 5 different levels you can choose from, Low, Medium, High, Very High, Max that you can choose from.

  1. As long as the default volume level you hear between the OPN and the Intent sounds the same to you, don’t worry about the default volume numbers on the iPhone. It’s possible that the Intent has more headroom for volume adjustment, so the iPhone calculates its default volume at a lower number. But if the default volume level of the Intent indeed sounds lower than the OPN at the default volume level of 70, then you can always ask your audi to bring up the overall volume of the Intent to match with that of the OPN, if that’s what you prefer.
1 Like
#4

You may wish to ask your audi to order the Oticon Remote for you, if you don’t already have one from your OPNs.
I got mine with the OPNs, and it works with every generation of Oticon.
You can change volume - change programs - and MUTE!!

3 Likes
#5

Thank you all for your responses. This forum is a very good resource that I wish I had found earlier in my hearing loss journey.

3 Likes
#6

New user to this forum. Thanks to those who are kind enough to offer wisdom and feedback.

I have a similar story to AB1. I’ve been using Oticon Opn2 hearing aids for 5 1/2 years and recently opted to try an upgrade to Oticon Intent1. I’ve been using them now for about a month in my permitted trial period and honestly have had mixed results to date. I do believe that some of my trouble ties to issues that can be remedied with fitting and programming enhancements.

With the new Intent’s, there’s been some upside to noticeable enhanced amplification and some improvement in voice understanding, I am, however, dissatisfied right now with a far less “natural sound” than what was provided by my older Oticon Opn hearing aids. I am also am experiencing some periodic and distracting electronic “warbling” type feedback noise, as a reaction to loud spoken words, (often my own voice), or with exposure to select other voices, sounds or frequencies. My provider suggests that this is some sort of noise cancellation response? I never had this issue with my prior pair.

As my hearing loss is deemed SEVERE, I have custom earmolds. My initial set of custom earmolds have not been comfortable, are larger in size than what I has with the Opn and they also came with a closed Vent, which I found just terrible. My hearing provider was able to modify them to include a VERY small vent, but the size of venting is still woefully inadequate. (This versus the vent size I had with my prior pair). I will likely need to scrap my current ear molds to something different with enhanced venting in the day ahead to see if it results in a better sound for me.

Another odd side effect I’ve noticed with the new Oticon Intents is very poor and somewhat distorted hearing when I’m in a small confined environment. For example, when I’m inside my vehicle with music playing and passenger conversation, I feel as if the hearing aid sensors are fighting to try and identify the sounds I’m exposed to and what to prioritize. As a result, no sounds are clear to me. It’s terrible.

Open to feedback from anyone on what I’ve presented above and I’m happy to answer specific questions. I’m also interested in whether there is some good benefit to working with a hearing provider that has a strong and ongoing working history with the Oticon Intent hearing aids specifically. This assumes a somewhat better insight into effective programming of this particular model, fitting issues, etc, versus someone who has not had extensive history with the Intent.

#7

Welcome to our community! As a fellow Oticonian, we are glad to help.
No Phony Phonakians, here!

Discuss with your HCP what sounds "unatural"to you so they can adjust the settings. I wore the OPN OPN S, and More before getting the Intent last month, and if anything, these are the most natural of them.

The later generation of Oticon introduced a new feedback system, which does indeed cause the warbling, or flutter at certain frequencies.
Most users don’t experience this phenomena, but those of us who do, are always conscious of it.
The fix is in the Genie2 fitting software under the Automatics section, where the Feedback Manager can be set to Low or Off. Test it at your next appointment, and see if the Low setting is adequate.

Yes, the new molds accommodate the “Detect” receivers which are calibrated, the venting can be changed, and to alleviate discomfort, apply Miricell ear drops before inserting them. You will adapt.

This is a function of More Sound Intelligence and the DNN. Explain to your HCP exactly what you are experiencing, and they can correct this.

Very important to find a HCP trained on all the features and functionality of the Intents.
Oticon provides tech support for fitters , and if yours is not up to speed, they should phone support while you are there, in order to get you sorted!
Or get another HCP who is Oticon trained.
Good Luck.

3 Likes
#8

@Chauncy29 @flashb1024 has done a great job of explaining to you what you should do. I am a 14 year veteran of Oticon aids. I have almost 2 months now with my INTENT1 aids and they are by far my favorite aids with a completely natural sound. You really need to get with your audiologist and get your aids set properly. My audiologist always copies my settings from my previous Oticon aids to my new aids and then make the needed adjustments to bring my fitting up to the new aids capabilities.
I have a saying any hearing aid fitting is at lease 60% the audiologist abilities and 20% the aids and 20% or more the patient’s ability to explain the needs, what the patient is hearing feeling and desires. Put the responsibility where it belongs and get your audiologist to do the job.

3 Likes
#9

Thanks for the information posted. Two other topics to ask about.

  1. What logic is there to have multiple listening style programs set up on an Oticon Intent, given the hearing aid’s smart premise, whereby it is supposedly able to automatically adjust to various environmental conditions? My provider set up only 1 primary listening program, in addition to one with a tinnitus white noise feature. I’ve seen other people reference having multiple programs, Speech In Noise, etc. Should I do this, or is this unnecessary?

  2. After using the Intent for a month, my overall listening perception is that my Oticon Intent hearing aids are perhaps trying too hard to identify and showcase too many ambient sounds. For example, let’s say I’m waking down my own residential street. Today, I’m now far more aware of imperceptible and honestly somewhat distracting sounds from multiple sources that are not all that important to me. (Neighbor’s leaf blower, a passing car, airplane overheard, dog barking, etc). Of course some folks may relish that these sounds are heard, and shout "Hooray! In my opinion, however, these are not priority sounds. It’s like my new hearing aids are trying to present me with a “little bit of a lot,” versus “a lot of a little.” Like most people, my bias is clarity of spoken word, (a crystal clear understanding of my spouse’s voice taking that neighborhood walk with me). Instead, her voice is not standing out from the clutter sounds. Again, this issue may well be resolved with future programming tweaks from a skilled provider. Forgive me if I’m not effectively articulating the issue of concern. Bottom line, I don’t care if I hear a neighbor’s leaf blower 50 yards away, if it interferes with prioritized spoken word understanding.

#10

I have the INTENT1 aids and only the default program, and itbis the only one I feel like I need and it definitely the only one I want. It normally takes more than a single appointment to get hearing aids properly adjusted. I have had my INTENT1 for almost 2 months. I haven’t needed any major changes. My aids are fitted by coping the settings from my Real1 aids to my INTENT1 aids then the adjustments are done to give me the advantages of the INTENT1 aids.
I do have my annual hearing test scheduled for September, at which time I will be asking for improvement in speech in noise and soft speech. Neither adjustments are major just minor changes.

#11

This is strictly a personal choice. Like @cvkemp Chuck says, he’s very happy with the General program for his listening.
I’m a bit of a “tweaker”, who always wants to try alternatives, so I have at various times had Music/Lecture/SIN in addition to General.
At this time I have a custom Music program, and Lecture program.
Each program is designed for a specific function, which in some user’s cases requires more or less processing.
Music uses pure tones, which conflict with the General program, because it interprets those tones as feedback, or noise, and attempts to suppress them, which is detrimental. It also focuses on a narrow frequency response, which will cut off a lot of bass and treble, and can distort midrange. So, a dedicated Music program turns off all the digital processing used to enhance speech, and reduce what it determines as undesirable input.

The Lecture program, adjusts the directionality to focus the mics to the front of you, which is ideal for meetings, and I use it a lot for general TV shows.
So, it’s up to you how much customization you require.

This is a great explanation of your issue, and if you explain it to your hcp just as you have here, they can make the required adjustments.
Remember, like Chuck said, it takes time and effort to achieve a good outcome.

2 Likes
#12

Wow!! This has been a great thread about the oticon intent 1. I’ve had them for 4 months now and really like them. You have given me a much better understanding of “how to express” to my hcp what I am hearing around me. I will better be able to express my hearing situations better to her at my next appointment. I wasn’t sure what and how to express certain issues. I thought they were just issues with having hearing aids in general. I have noticed them adjusting to my needs better through time.

#13

Honestly, I’m surprised that coming from the OPN for the last 5 years that you’re still bothered with the little sounds that you hear around you. I’m not sure if the HCP can do much magic to make the disappear in favor for speech and speech only for you. The open paradigm that Oticon promotes relies on the fact that your brain hearing will eventually learn to ignore what you don’t want to hear and be able to just focus on what you want to hear.

The fact that you’re now noticing even more of the little sounds with the Intent now compared to the OPN that you’ve had for the last 5 years is an indication that the Intent is giving you even more clarity of all sounds around you than the OPN could. If you hadn’t let the OPN’s open paradigm bother you so far for the last 5 years, I’d say that just keep on with the Intent and don’t let the more little sounds that you can hear with the Intent bother you to the point of thinking it as a negative that it will require making your HCP adjust to tune them out, because it’s more than likely that your HCP won’t be able to perform that miracle for you. I think if you just take a positive attitude and not allow those new little sounds to bother you, eventually your brain hearing will do the miracle that your HCP most likely can’t and will tune out those “more little sounds” for you.

#14

Good insights and very much appreciated. The bottom line, however, is that the overwhelming goal for any hearing aid user is an enhanced understanding of the human voice. As such, anything and everything that prevents or interferes with the clear, enunciated understanding of language is a distraction. This is my opinion. I accept the premise that other noises may well become less recognizable and bothersome over time. One month in, my brain has yet to tune out the noise clutter.

Here’s more color on my situation. I have a part-time semi retirement job in Guest Services working at a large indoor recreation center. Part of the focus of the facility is a children’s play environment that caters to the pre-school and elementary school age crowd. (Love the kids!) While I try and avoid working at busy times, occasionally the volume level in the facility is quite loud. Ideally the Oticon Intent would mitigate this annoying crowd noise, to some extent, to permit what is really most critical to me. (An enhanced understanding of the human voice when someone is 3-5 feet away). This is not happening after one month. The close-in voices interpreted by my brain with the new hearing aids comes to me with sort of an artificial amplification sound and frankly is somewhat distorted. The background clutter noise remains a major distraction and hinders clear voice understanding. As an FYI, I have experimented with manually reducing mid frequency sounds on my app by a few decibels. While this modestly reduces the sound of the background clutter, it also has the negative side effect of hindering close range voice recognition as well.

I fully understand that people such as myself, with severe hearing loss, need to have have modest expectations. Still though, I was anticipating greater effectiveness to date. Again, it is my opinion that some of my issues can and will be resolved given more time and programming tweaks by a skilled hearing professional who understands my issues and desires.

1 Like
#15

You did not say much at all about how the OPN 2 fared for you in the last 5.5 years with respect to noisy sounds. I think you simply said that the Intent provides a far less “natural sound”, but not much else. Are you not hearing any of the non-speech sounds from the OPN 2? Being the first of the open paradigm-based hearing aid model, I would think that you would hear non-speech sounds with the OPN 2 as well, no? So how did you deal with the non-speech sounds that you’ve been hearing with your OPN 2 differently, compared to the non-speech sounds that you’ve been hearing with the Intent now?

The Intent has more range on the Neural Noise Suppression values compared to that of the OPN 2 Noise Suppression range. Have you tried to ask you HCP to simply increase the Neural Noise Suppression to a high value for you to suppress the noise sounds that you don’t want to hear? I think you can have as much as 12 db max neural noise suppression set for the Intent 1, while you can only have a max noise removal value of 5 db on the OPN 2.

You also said that you’re hearing warbling on loud spoken words on the Intent compared to the OPN 2. This is understandable because with the More going forward to the Intent, there is a new Feedback Management that can cause some warbling to be heard. Just have your HCP dial down the Feedback Management setting from Normal to Low to help alleviate this warbling.

#16

My past experience with the OPN 2 was generally positive. I had far less awareness of random sounds than what I have today using the Intent. The awareness of them was far, far more muted than what I now experience. Rest assured, it’s not like I am adverse to the increased awareness of select environmental sounds. If I hear birds chirping in the distance that’s swell. What I don’t want is the sound of a passing car, or the sound of a nearby lawnmower to be so overwhelming to me with the new hearing aids that it impacts my speech understanding when someone is adjacent to me talking. I just get the vibe that the Intent’s are sometimes offering too much volume and stimuli that is inconsequential to my needs.

For further background, I choose to upgrade from my older OPN 2 hearing aids as reprogramming efforts over the past year or so failed to give me any sort of noticeable boost in speech understanding. Toggling up volume levels was counter productive, as I simply heard a louder version of something that my brain could not understand. I’ve had multiple brain scans to see if there were any physiological issues that could be impacting my hearing. (All negative) These were also initiated due to a major issue over the past 2 years with intermittent tinnitus and/or auditory hallucination sounds that have adversely impacted my sleep. During the daytime, while wearing hearing aids, this issue is manageable.

My hearing loss, without hearing aids, has me in the grey zone whereby my hearing is generally poor, even with hearing aids, but remains above the threshold where a cochlear implant is possible. My recent audiological evaluation and ENT consult were performed at the Mayo Clinic, so I have good confidence in the findings.

#17

Let us know if having your HCP increase the value of the Neural Noise Suppression does help give you a better balance between speech and the surrounding sounds or not. I think that it’s really the main parameter that can probably help you suppressing the “noise” in favor of the speech the most, and there’s a lot of room to set this up with, up to 12 db for the Intent 1. It would be interesting to know what the NNS value it is currently set at, and what the NNS value it gets changed to, before you get the effect you desire.

Also ask your HCP to show you how your Environmental Classifier is set up. Below is an example of it. There are 5 different environments from Very Simple to Very Complex, and they can be organized into 2 group classifications as seen below. What you see below is typically how they’re divided, but If you find that you even prefer to have the Simple one moved over to the Difficult classification, then ask your audi to do so.

image
image1596×935 173 KB

Ask your HCP if they have the Audibility Contrast Threshold test available. If yes, ask them to run it and apply the result into Genie 2 so that all the MoreSound Intelligence parameters can be set based on the ACT result → hopefully more accurate settings that can take the guess work of doing this manually. Not all HCP can do the ACT tests, however, because it’s less than a year old and requires compatible audiometers that the HCP might not have.

You DO have fairly severe hearing loss even in the low frequencies, so that would be a challenging loss to fit well to begin with. Most people have more modest hearing loss at the lower frequency range (and it only slopes off in the mids and highs), so they get to enjoy a wider dynamic range in the low frequency range to help them discern the various sounds at various volume levels better in the low range. You don’t have that luxury of a wider dynamic range in the lows to discern and learn which sound to suppress and which sound to focus on, because most of the amplification for many of these sounds need to be fairly strong to begin with for you. So they “compete” for your attention more evenly and that makes it harder for you to ignore sounds you don’t want to hear if they’re just as loud as the speech you want to hear.

I’ve seen some folks with this level of hearing loss in the low frequency range (like you do) tending to fare better on hearing aid brands that focus more on directionality control using beam forming, rather than with the open paradigm type of aids like the Oticon aids here. The more aggressive directionality control using beam forming is usually more effective at blocking out sounds coming from various directions. usually the kind of sounds that you don’t care to hear from to begin with.

If you haven’t purchased the Intent 1 yet and are still in a trial period, you might want to try some other brand, like the Phonak Lumity. They’re quite advanced aids, and they don’t prescribe to the open paradigm like the way Oticon aids do. I’ve known of a forum member with a similar heavy low frequency hearing loss like you do, who tried the OPN 1 in earnest but could never be happy with it due to its open paradigm not being very suitable for her type of severe hearing loss in the low ends, then switched over to the Phonak brand aids and they have worked very well for her ever since.

#18

Volisiano has hit the nail on the head in his advice, I had some similar thoughts. NNS is normally set to middle settings, and can be dialled up to 12db. The environmental sounds from the kids playing must be really high, so have your Audi setup a separate SIN program with suppression maxed out and try it out.

I moved from Phonak Paradise to Oticon Intents, and to be honest love the more open environmental sounds. For example whilst walking with my intents I can hear a bicycle approaching, with my Paradise I would only hear it after it passes me. Environmental has become one of the things I like most on Intents. It also works both ways as some sounds were extremely high with the Phonaks, which have now become more background with the Intents.

Would highly suggest you try the NSS and classifier at better settings.

#19

Adding to my initial post after some more time with the Intent. Bass sounds while streaming are much better with the new Intent with open bass domes versus the Opn with open domes. Should I have had the open bass domes all along? I don’t remember if they were available when I frist got the Opns 5 years ago.

#20

With open domes your losing some Bass out, but then again you have pretty good low end anyway looking at you audogram.