Jeremy “Ziby” Zbieszkowski Hearing Loss History
I am blind and have had a moderate to severe sensorineural hearing loss for several decades.
At the age of 7 I got my first pair of analog BTE Phonak hearing aids and used that brand till the age of 30.
There was rarely a need for adjustments, just the normal replacement of tubes.
Then there was the Starkly brand for about a decade and a half.
These analog BTE aids were also low maintenance. Then came the Starkly digital BTE aids which had a different sound and often needed more than the usual amount of fine tuning! I miss the reliability and sound quality of those old analog BTE aids! Next I have been using the Resound 9 61 Quatro Rechargeable hearing aids for almost five years now. I love streaming music from my Apple I-Phone through the Resound Smart 3D app. I also enjoy using the Resound Multi Mic to my laptop by way of 3.5mm audio jack wire. The NVDA screen reader feature works well with this method. It took three different audiologist and two Resound reps to fine tune the music settings correctly! It took several years for them to do that and fix the compression problems!
My retired audiologist said this, The things that made the most difference for your hearing were lessening the compression and raising MPO for your All-Around program. These changes made the biggest difference, to give you a fuller sound and more access to sound—super important for your hearing! I love the natural sound of the Resound brand, but I hate how often they need adjustments and repairs. Now I just got a pair of Costco Jabra EP 20 hearing aids and they seem to be having trouble fixing the feedback problem in the right aid.
When I asked about the importance of the vent size and fit of the custom skeletal earmolds, they did not seem able to answer my question in a satisfying way. They went with a software adjustment, that only helped a little. I found out from visiting another audiologist that My Costco vent size is less than 0.8. She suggested a refit and a lowering of the highs. Bottom line, it’s almost impossible to find a good audiologist to fine tune hearing aids! I love this Hearing Tracker website because it helps me to be a more informed hearing aid wearer.