Phonak, no, phone, ACK!!!

So, today I went again to the audiologist, whose name is Jobe Schwartz, by the way. She is cool. Anyway, she gave me two new hearing aids to try, called Phonak. They are incredibly expensive -- $4800. And of course, insurance does NOT cover them. (If anyone out there would like to contribute to my hearing aid fund we would be most grateful! Email me at rsusselj@otponline.net for details on how to do so.). So, I am going to try them out for two weeks. Jobe asked me to keep track of what I am hearing and what not so I am going to use my blog here to do that.

First, she puts them on and makes a series of adjustments to them via a computer program. These are digital hearing aids -- and POWER digital aids -- I think the first of this kind. I have tried digital aids in the past but had not been too happy with them. I found that I simply could never get enough volume with them. I had been begging for power digital aids but until now I had not been aware of any. These ARE power aids, let me tell you. I have been hearing sound ALL day. It sounds like there are airplanes flying overhead constantly. But it was not unpleasant, nor did it interfere with my hearing. Also these hearing aids have a program called "EZPhone". EZPhone works by automatically detecting the magnet of a phone receiver pressed up against the ear and automatically turning on the hearing aids' telecoil which is the part of the aid that enables hearing on telephones. This is not 100% foolproof as it may not always detect the magnet so there is a button that allows one to manually turn on the telecoil. Now, there are basically 3 modes of hearing aid use: normal, normal/telephone, or telephone only. For me, personally, I have always preferred to use the telephone only mode when on the phone. I have always had a problem with hearing on the phone if I can also hear the noise around me. In the telecoil only mode, I would hear ONLY what the person on the other end of the phone was saying and not the noise around me at my end. (Of course, now with cell phones that are so sensitive that they pick up every little sound, that problem has returned.) Anyway, the default EZPhone program is a mixed normal/telecoil program and that did not work for me. So, I asked Jobe if it were possible to change the EZPhone program to automatically detect and switch to full telecoil mode. She was not sure but she called Phonak, and lo and behold! - Yes, it was possible. Phonak told her how to do it and it was done. So now, the phone rings, I pick it up and put it to my ear -- and I can hear on the phone. I no longer have to turn my hearing aid switch to telecoil first. COOL.

The thing is, I used to also turn the other hearing aid off when I was on the phone. But this time, I decided to see what would happen if I use the phone, with 1 hearing aid in full telecoil mode and the other in full normal mode. Well, it seemed to be fine. But I did not use the phone a whole lot today. We will see how it works tomorrow.

I listened to a music CD in the car. It was not so great -- for some reason the compression feature of the hearing aids kept kicking in and I would keep experiences moments of "dead time" -- like the sound of silence when a radio station suddenly loses its signal or simply stops broadcasting. I am going to watch that. With my old hearing aids (Sumo) they would compress when I would take the subway or walk the streets (of Manhattan) but these hearing aids did not do that at those times.

Soon, I am going to watch TV. I am going to experiment with watching without CC but I do not have high hopes for that. But I am keeping and open mind (and ears...)

Good night!