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Hearing Aids – Getting the Most Out of Them By Robert Gilligan and Julie Hill
Hearing Aids A Practical Guide
Hearing and Happiness.
Good hearing is essential for good communication and good communication is essential for happy relationships with both family and friends. The good news is that most people with hearing loss can regain their ability to communicate well in most situations. Modern hearing aids are microcomputers self-adjusting thousands of times per second, restoring the sounds of life, are natural sounding, clear and entirely different from anything your parents or grandparents may have used in the past. This book has two primary purposes: 1) 2)
To help demystify hearing aids and make your purchase journey easier. Once you have purchased hearing aids, to help you get the best results from them.
A key thing to remember is that hearing aids are designed to ‘aid’ your hearing and are not magic bullets which restore your hearing to perfection. To get the best success from your hearing aids you will need to take a little time to relearn and develop a few basic listening skills. This book will help you accomplish this.
Table of Contents
Section 1: Hearing Aids 101 •
Chapter 1
Buyers Guide
o
Shapes and Styles
o
Who needs what?
o
Should I be getting one or two?
o
What technology would work for me?
o
Prices – what do I really get for my dollar?
•
Chapter 2
o
How do I get them into my ears?
♣
Left vs Right
♣
BTE or RIC
♣
ITE, ITC or CIC
o
Cleaning & Maintenance
o
Trouble shooting
o
Changing Programs
o
Accessories and Assistive Listening Devices
o
Storage and safety considerations
o
Asking questions vs saying ‘What?’
o
Open and Closed questions (Specific Questions)
o
Setting the scene – environmental factors
o
Anticipatory Strategies or Predicting Dialogue
•
Chapter 2
o
Dealing with Fast Talkers
o
Dealing with ‘Mumblers’
Users Introduction to Hearing Aids
Assertiveness
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Section 2: Listening Situations •
Introduction
•
Chapter 1
o
Restaurant
o
Meeting
o
Car
o
Auditorium
o
Theatre
o
On the golf Course
o
Listening to Music
o
Listening to a cashier or sales person
o
Airport
o
Outdoors
o
In a Café
o
At a Sports Event
o
In the home
♣
Kitchen
♣
Between rooms
♣
Family gatherings
o
Using a home telephone and mobile phone
o
At the Movies
Specific listening environments
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Section 3: Communication Strategies •
Introduction
•
Chapter 1
o
Asking questions vs saying ‘What?’
o
Open and Closed questions (Specific Questions)
o
Setting the scene – environmental factors
o
Anticipatory Strategies or Predicting Dialogue
•
Chapter 2
o
Dealing with Fast Talkers
o
Dealing with ‘Mumblers’
Communication Repair Strategies
Assertiveness
Section 4: Family and Friends – Getting the Family Involved ♣
Introduction
♣
Chapter 1
o
The Golden Word!
o
Don’t shout - speak clearly
o
Pacing Speech
o
Facing the Person
o
Rewording versus repeating
o
Minimizing Noise
o
Helping people seek help & Identifying hearing loss
o
Motivate and encourage
o
In the Home
Helping in Specific Situations
Section 5: Developing Your Communication Skills •
Introduction
•
Chapter 1:
Speech Reading Basics
•
Chapter 2:
Practicing Repair Strategies
•
Chapter 3:
How to Practice listening
o
At home
o
On the Phone
o
Ready for noisy places
Section 6: Medical Considerations o
Who is at risk of hearing loss?
o
Signs and complications of untreated hearing loss
o
Tinnitus or Ringing in the Ears
o
FDA medical waiver check list
Chapter 1 Buyers Guide
B.T.E
Shapes and Styles Hearing Aids come in a number of different shapes and sizes. There are very small ones that sit deep inside the ear canal and can barely be seen. And there are large devices that sit behind the ear and are connected to the ear with a plastic ear mold and tube. This next section will give you a brief description of each and why each might be used.
B.T.E Get their name as they sit Behind The Ear. BTE devices are designed to help people with severe to profound hearing losses. A person with a severe or profound loss will not be able to hear much at all without hearing aids. These devices tend to be the largest of the hearing aid types as the speaker (or receiver) needs to be big to be able to produce a sound loud enough; the battery needs to be large to be able to supply the powerful speaker and the rest of the components with enough power, and the housing needs to be large to accommodate all the electronics and battery. The end result is normally a device around 2� or 5cm in length. The hearing aid connects to an ear-mold which directs the sound into the ear. Ear molds are custom made plastic molds which sit in the ear canal; they are connected to the BTE via a piece of clear tubing; (See photos 1 & 2).
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BUYERS GUIDE
Ill.2
R.I.C.:
R.I.C.
Get their name as the Receiver sits In the Ear canal; (receiver is another name for speaker). These devices are the most common fit today. They are small devices which sit behind the ear and are connected to the receiver or speaker which is in the ear canal by a fine wire. When sitting in place correctly these devices are almost invisible (assuming you have a little bit of hair). The reason these devices are so popular is twofold. RIC’s devices tend to be less prone to breakdown. This is because the electronics are a little further away from the moisture and wax which is found in the ear canal. They also have great sound quality. As the microphone is behind the ear and the speaker is in the ear, the likelihood of the device feeding back (or whistling) is dramatically reduced. This allows the manufacturer to use small silicon tips to hold the speaker in place. And this in turn allows natural sounds to enter the ear and also allows your own voice out of your head. That sounds a bit strange, however when we speak our voice vibrates our skull bones and generates our voice as we hear it inside the ear canal. When you listen to a recording of your voice you say that it sounds very different from what you think your voice sounds like. Well that is because you hear your own voice differently than other hear it. In short, having open ear canals as is possible with RIC’s (at least for most people) leaves your voice sounding more natural. Finally, the combination of size and the fine wire that goes into the earcanal, makes these devices almost invisible when viewed front on. If the user has a reasonable amount of hair, then these devices can be completely invisible. Approximately 80% of all hearing aids fit today in the USA are this style. (See photos 3 & 4).
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Ill.4
I.T.E. Get their name from the fact that they sit In The Ear. They are custom made devices with the electronics built into a custom fit plastic shell. To have one of these made for your ear you need a hearing specialist to take an impression of your ear. They do this by carefully blocking the ear canal with a small piece of foam or cotton and injecting a viscous rubbery material that hardens within 3-5 minutes. This is sent to the manufacturer and they produce a device that will fit only your ear.
I.T.E.
The main advantage of these devices is that they don’t sit behind the ear. In some people the space behind the ear is quite small so the RIC or BTE types don’t sit comfortably or together with glasses the space is too small to accommodate both. The electronics in these devices are in close proximity to wax and moisture from the ear so they can be more prone to moisture and wax related problems. If you use this style of hearing aid it is advisable to keep your hearing aids in a dehumidifier (specially designed for hearing aids). Also your own voice can echo or boom a little more that with a RIC device. See photos 5 & 6 to see what they look like on and off the ear.
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BUYERS GUIDE
Ill.6
I.T.C. Get their name from the fact that they sit In The Canal of the ear. They are custom made devices with the electronics built into a custom fit plastic shell.
UD MAGNIBH EX
To have one of these made for your ear you need a hearing specialist to take an impression of your ear. They do this by carefully blocking the ear canal with a small piece of foam or cotton and injecting a viscous rubbery material that hardens within 3-5 minutes. This is sent to the manufacturer and they produce a device that will fit only your ear. The main advantages of these devices are that they are usually quite easy to put into the ear and are reasonably discreet. The electronics in these devices are in close proximity to wax and moisture from the ear so they can be more prone to moisture and wax related problems. If you use this style of hearing aid it is advisable to keep your hearing aids in a dehumidifier (specially designed for hearing aids). Also your own voice can echo or boom a little more that with a RIC device. See photos 7 & 8 to see what they look like on and off the ear.
Ill.7
Ill.8
C.I.C. Get their name from the fact that they sit Completely in The Canal of the ear. They are custom made devices with the electronics built into a custom fit plastic shell. To have one of these made for your ear you need a hearing specialist to take an impression of your ear. They do this by carefully blocking the ear canal with a small piece of foam or cotton and injecting a viscous rubbery material that hardens within 3-5 minutes. This is sent to the manufacturer and they produce a device that will fit only your ear. The main advantage of these devices is that they are very discreet. The electronics in these devices are in close proximity to wax and moisture from the ear so they can be more prone to moisture and wax related problems. If you use this style of hearing aid it is advisable to keep your hearing aids in a dehumidifier (specially designed for hearing aids). Also your own voice can echo or boom a little more that with a RIC device. Also they have the ability to reduce background noise in these devices is not as good as in the other styles; as all the other models can have directional microphones (this allows the devices to focus on sounds just in front of the listener therefore cutting out a significant proportion of the surrounding
C.I.C
background noise. See photos 9 & 10 to see what they look like on and off the ear.
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BUYERS GUIDE
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