The first thing I did was to watch videos on Dr Cliff’s site and the videos by Matthew Allsop on the Hearing Tracker site to educate myself about the current available brands and models and to get a sense of what the latest technology levels are. This was great. For example, I found out about Widex hearing aids, which are highly respected by musicians (the mmusic capabilities of hearing aids are very important to me). I had never heard of Widex, and no audiologist had ever mentioned Widex to me as a possible choice, despite me saying how important music is to me.
Armed with this knowledge, I decided I wanted to have a choice of various HAs, I was focusing on Widex, ReSound and Oticon (but also wanted to know about Starkey and others). That ruled out all the high street chains for me, because they have a very restricted range available. I then found hearingaid.org.uk, an online outlet that offers fitting at home through a network of audioloigists. They offer most brands at good prices. However, I rang them and spoke to them to find out who their local audiologists to me were. There were three, I rang them all and found they only fitted Phonak and Oticon, so no chance to try Widex, ReSound or anything else.
I then investigated all the local small chains and independents. I looked at their websites and spoke to several. I checked their background and what aids they fitted. I also asked a few key questions, for example if I go for ReSound, should I wait until the Nexia platform is rolled out in Europe (at the time I was doing this, Nexias were available in the US but not Europe). Only one audiologist was able to answer my questions, and could also talk to me about the technology available in every brand and the pros/cons of every brand. This audi also has a degree in sound engineering and acoustics, so understands my needs as a musician and music producer and I am confident in his ability to do custom programming for me.
So after 15 years of wearing hearing aids I finally feel like I am in control of the process. I realise I am a very demanding customer, but for the money I am spending I feel I have every right to be.