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Cannot understand voices in supermarket

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Hi all, i find i can talk to post office staff but not supermarket staff behind counter. The background noise it’s not too noisy but when I watch other people order they seem to hear okay . I don’t currently wear hearing aids. Is starkey livio edge 2400 ite adequate for severe/profound loss? I am still deciding which hearing aid to choose.

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Edited

On monday next week I will have an audiology appointment for first time in 30 yrs. At the moment I’m just researching the different types of hearing aids from this forum and online and oticon more and starkey sounds good. Audiologist i will take onboard their recommendation. I find it hard to trust as i got conned into buying a cic from a hearing aid dispenser. Google didn’t exist at the time. Thanks

Good stuff! I wish you all the best of lick in finding a good audiologist who will be your partner in finding the right instruments for you and your hearing loss.

[I’m an Oticon fan - I currently use More1s, and they work very well for me - but not everyone likes their Open Sound philosophy. The make of with which the audiologist is familiar/experienced also will play a big role in your satisfaction.]

@SpudGunner thanks! I will give the oticon more and starkey livio edge ite but get my audiometrist recommendation first. After watching Dr Cliff on YouTube I had to search for a clinic that does real ear measurement. Your posts i have found very helpful. Do you struggle with conversation at 2 metre distance? With hearing amplifiers alone i can hear at 1 metre distance in one ear as the other is profound. can imagine background noise is still a problem even with the oticon more as hearing loss is so complex especially when severe and beyond

Edited

Not sure why audios do word and sentence tests with electonic voice. Came back from audio today and such lovely people. I could understand receptionist when she talks. In the booth i could hear the beeping sounds but could not understand a word in the booth with headphones. I would have received zero score on the word and sentencing test. I can understand audi when she speaks at a normal volume close up and in the booth too but not the electronic voice with headphones. I will see in 2 weeks time with trial hearing aids how much improvement there is with word recognition.

Hi. I’m not sure which brand would be best, but with my current one, I got it because I found it hard to have conversations in loud environments. There is a switch at the back that I pressed and it focussed the sound. It definitely made a difference when I go to loud restaurants.

Edited

@lhall2182 That’s good to know you are able to converse in a noisy restaurant situation. I am glad to hear that modern hearing aids have that capability. I am going to trial the custom starkey livio ai edge 2400 and test the edge function in a noisy supermarket. Thanks for your comments which is encouraging.

Yesterday my Audio recommended starting with the smaller Starkey ITC and then if i need more power move up to the custom full shell .

When i look up the specifications for Starkey Livio Ai 2400 the ITC and half shell ITE are identical and don’t have . My best guess is that people would only prefer the half shell over the in the canal (ITC) if they needed a bit more battery life and need something bigger for finger dexterity.

The full shell ITE is only 5db higher in volume and has telecoil and longer battery life as the mould is much bigger to fit the concha part of the ear.

Starkey specifications show that the full shell does have a bit more volume and gain although not as much gain in some of the higher frequencies as compared with ITC and ITE.

I thought that may help other people decide if they like these Starkey Livio Edge Ai 2400 models ITC and ITE.

Cosmetically i would prefer the ITC and don’t see any benefit in moving up to the full shell ITE unless the telecoil was needed.

Has anyone on this forum tested the Starkey Livio Ai 2400 Edge ITC and found any significant difference with the Full Shell ITE? Mostly i am wondering if there was any noticeable difference in the 5db volume and if anyone here has high frequency loss notice any difference. It is quite a difference in price just to receive a bigger mould, telecoil and longer battery life and no other significant benefit.

I will be paying $6500 for ITC pair plus $1500 for the 3 yr service in the coming weeks after the mould is taken and retesting with aids on. My yesterday shows a 30db drop in my left ear for most of the frequencies and my right ear is only slightly worse when compared to the audiogram that i posted here which is 30 yrs old.

Edited

My audiologist mentioned she will do frequency compression for my Starkely Livio Edge 2400 hearing aids as i have severe high frequency hearing loss. From what i understand is that the high frequencies will be shifted to the mid-low range frequencies as these ranges are moderate for my hearing loss and will cause my speech understanding to be better. Hearing loss seems to be more complicate that i ever imagined. As Starkey 2400 Edge has AI, i was expecting they would have Oticons equivalent of speech rescue. How much better is speech rescue as compared with frequency compression?

In reply to @Deafas

Glad I could help :slight_smile: With brands, I don’t know a lot about that. My current one is Unitron and then my new ones my Audiologist was like ‘so, what do you think of Unitron?’ and I’m going with them again, lol.

Hope you will have a chance to “trial” whatever hearing aid they recommend.
Please ask about Signia AX. Brand new. less expensive than many and for the FIRST TIME, I can understand speech in noisy situations.

In reply to @Deafas

@Deafas said:

How much better is speech rescue as compared with frequency compression?

To my knowledge, there has only been one study comparing different types of . Compression came out very slighty on top, so I suppose the answer is: Speech rescue is NOT better than frequency compression.

@SpudGunner thanks for sending out the referrals to the other forum members! Much appreciated. @Neville i am guessing Oticon would have their reasons for Speech rescue rather than frequency compression and the same for other hearing aid manufacturers who have their own version of speech rescue. Perhaps “better” wasn’t the right word i chose. I suspect i have dead regions in the cochlear in both ears as i have no word or sentence understanding in the audio test and the high frequency loss would no doubt be the cause. As i have congenital hearing loss it is progressive. I was told by my audio that there is only a narrow range for adjustment that they have for my type of hearing loss. My understanding is that they say speech rescue allows for a more natural sounding voice when compared with F/Compression. I wouldn’t want female voices to sound like men, lol

Edited

Here is a bit of humour for the day. A week before my audio appointment i decided to clean out my ears as i have a lot of practice over the decades from watching my doctor insert a wire with cotton to clean out the wax so i do nowadays. I don’t like the syringe method as the water makes me extremely dizzy. Actually since i stopped eating fatty foods due to oesophogal reflux i only have very minimal wax in my ears since and that is 5 years now! So i use a fine wire with tissue carefully wrapped around it as i normally do to clean out the ears. Please don’t try it people as you could damage your ear drum or push the wax further down the canal. I have past experience with ceramol which is a wax softener from the chemist. You can use olive oil warmed up too. Unknowingly there was a bit of tissue residue left behind as i was a bit hasty and i like going to my medical appointments clean not dirty if you get my drift. Anyway, when i went to my audio we were looking at my right canal with the tube inserted in my ear and BY GUM, you have a fungus in your ear! We were looking at this white fairy floss stuff in my ear on the big flat screen and i was thinking gees this isn’t good. So i have been booked to see a doctor to ensure the canal is free of fungus before getting fitted for h/aids. When i got home after the audio appointment i decided to clean the ear canal with the suppossed fungus and out dropped a bit of tissue paper, lol I will see the doc anyway just to be sure!

In reply to @Deafas

@Deafas said:

i am guessing Oticon would have their reasons for Speech rescue rather than frequency compression

Honestly, I’d always been under the impression that the reason was that when frequency compression first became available from another company it was patented and they couldn’t use it. Though, that doesn’t explain why they continued on with it.

@Deafas said:

they say speech rescue allows for a more natural sounding voice

It certainly sounds more natural to the normal hearing audiologist who is listening to it, especially when the higher frequencies that the user cannot hear are maintained. I’m not sure that’s relevant to the functional benefit to the user, however.

Edited

Thanks for all your replies people. It really does make a difference knowing the practicality of hearing aids from a users perspective rather than reading a catalogue or an audiologist point of view. I came back from my doctors appointment today and was given the all clear so i will be fitted shortly. With the perspex shields up i had great difficulty understanding what i was being told by the receptionist. Apparently my doctor was running late and i was called in the waiting room to reschedule but i did not hear anybody call me. It would be nice if an audiologist could lend all the brands such as Phonak, Oticon, Starkey, Widex for a trial period and let the user decide which aid sounds best in various situations. It sure would save people asking which brand is best? But then knowing the complexity of each users hearing loss the aid will need ongoing adjustment to get the fitting right. Then comes the fact that manufacturers are in fierce competition with each other so they would all be using the same kind of technology. I will give the Starkey livio edge hearing aids a try for 6 months and then ask for evaluation for a cochlear implant if i still get no word understanding. Hopefully Kanso 3 will be out by then with a tiny processor on the head and studded magnets so i can go walking in magpie season and come home with the processor still attached, just kidding of course.

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