CAUT

  • 1.  hearing aides

    Registered Piano Technician
    Posted 5 days ago

    I just had my hearing checked at Costco. I've had it done there every two or three years for the past 15 years. While I'm still within a suitable range, my upper register is getting close to the range to where the technician told me I should consider getting hearing aides. On a scale of 1 - 10, with 1 being no need at all, and 10 being almost deaf, my upper range is close to 6 or 7. The rest of my hearing is in the 2 - 4 range.  I have two questions for those of you who have them.

    1. At what stage of your hearing loss did you get them?
    2. How long did it take you to get used to wearing them all day? 

    Thanks

    Wim



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    Willem "Wim" Blees, RPT
    St. Augustine, FL 32095
    Tnrwim@aol.com
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  • 2.  RE: hearing aides

    Registered Piano Technician
    Posted 21 hours ago
    1. I got mine about a year ago. I've known about diminished hearing for years, ever since Diane Hofsteder did some tests at an Annual Convention. She's the one who told me that losing just a few percent of your hearing at the highest frequencies can cause the inability to distinguish between "T" and "D" in speech. But the tipping point for me is when a customer asked me to fix a slight click on an upright, and I couldn't hear it. When I took off the upper cabinet, I could hear it. It was just a slightly loose hammer flange screw.
    2. I got the Jabra Enhance Pro set at Costco, and they're very comfortable to wear all day. It's a serious product, about $1600 for the pair, but I have to remove them to tune, as above middle C, they create an artifact like a shimmer. They're also Bluetooth ear buds, which I can make and receive calls with. I got the rechargeable ones, figuring that they would be sturdier, and I recharge them every night in their case. The battery-powered ones last about a week.

    It's certainly a touchy issue as a tuner, but certainly decades of tuning, especially uprights, has been a cause. Yet we all are comfortable with our vision aids when we need them. iPhones also let you turn them into a kind of mechanic's stethoscope, by activating the phone's microphone and sending audio right to the hearing aids, so you can move the phone around to try to pinpoint odd noises.

    I'm told there are over-the-counter models available at places like Best Buy in the $300 range. Apple's AirPods let you enter your audiogram info to work in the same way. It was pretty dramatic on the drive home the first day to hear all the noises in my car differently!

    --Cy-- 



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    Cy Shuster, RPT
    Fairfax, VA
    http://www.shusterpiano.com
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    Original Message


  • 3.  RE: hearing aides

    Registered Piano Technician
    Posted 17 hours ago
    I'm on my third pair. My hearing loss is unique to a specific job I had while in the Air Force so I've had some level of hearing loss since roughly 1969. It wasn't too bad at the beginning and, as long as I wore ear plugs when around machinery and tuning it was under control. But about ten years ago it started getting worse. As a hearing aid novice I went to a specialty hearing aid supplier.  Some $3,500 later I had my first pair of hearing aids. They were better than nothing but, because of their limited digital filtering they could not be adequately 'tuned' to my specific hearing loss.

    These came to an end when one of them was lost while I was in China. The next pair came from Costco and were a considerable improvement even though they cost half as much. Digital filtering had improved considerably and they could be set up more specifically to my particular needs. 

    Then a friend told me I should check back with the VA. Seems to have improved some in the last few years. The audiologist who tested me recognized the pattern of hearing loss and set me up with the hearing aids I now wear. They would have been out of my price range but, since the AF now acknowledges that my hearing loss started while stationed at a B-52 base in Thailand, they were supplied to me at no cost. They are by far the best I've had to date although they have been difficult to get used to. They required custom fitted ear inserts which are basically like active ear plugs. Getting used to speaking with them has been, well, interesting but they do the best job of aiding my hearing. We had dinner with friends this evening in a fairly noisy restaurant, the 'Restaurant' setting did a pretty good job of allowing me to participate in the conversation. The 'Music' setting works quite well although when I (rarely, nowadays) tune a piano I remove them.

    There is no one-size-fits-all solution here. I had good service at Costco for a very reasonable price. It wasn't their fault that the hearing aids I got weren't a perfect fit for me. I have several friends who use the same brand (Phillips) with better success. 

    For me, getting used to wearing them was easy. Perhaps because I've been using ear plugs for years. It probably would have been more difficult if I'd never had things stuck in my ears before. 

    Most of the hearing aids available today, at least the better ones, have Bluetooth capability. When I answer my cell phone the audio comes through the hearing aids -- the phone speaker is turned off. When I take Hobo for his daily walk I listen to books coming through my cell phone to my hearing aids. 

    Probably the best advice anyone can give you is to find a good audiologist, ask questions, explore options. I can't say anything about the relatively inexpensive OTC hearing aids available today. None of them would work for me, but they might be a good fit for others. 




    Original Message