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CI Rehabilitation after Activation

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To all you US people has anyone downloaded the Cochlear Copilot? If so what does it do please?
It’s only available in the US so we poor Aussies miss out again……Is it any good for helping with rehab?

Cochlear™ CoPilot Mobile Hearing App | Cochlear20

Cochlear CoPilot is an interactive app that helps you get the most out of your hearing implant. Download it for free.

Took a look at the Cochlear CoPilot app.
Looks like a rehabilitation app.
But I believe it’s only available to those with iOS products. Could not find it in my Google Play store.
Thanks Sheryl

While looking it reminded me of the Cochlear “Bring Back the Beat” app. I do have this app on my Android phone. It’s pretty good about music.

@Raudrive
Rick one of my FB friends was participating in this CoPilot trial, this is what she said… Rick it’s sounds very like what I did in my evaluation for here in Aus.

Hi Sheryl, I was participating in the CoPilot trial for several months. It is like listening to word and choose which word from multiple choice, completing missing word in a sentence, hearing then choose which sentence that you just heard, etc.
Sometimes the speaker speak too fast, sometimes it is okay. Overall, I like Hearoes apps better that Copilot apps. The Copilot team did ask for feedbacks and I send them several feedbacks. My trial already been ended just before the apps made available officially to USA.

Hi. New here. Just found this place a couple of months ago. I’m quite surprised at the number of people using apps to rehab. Perhaps that’s because this is an online forum and selects our tech savvy people. I was certainly told about the need for rehab before my implantation but most of it was in person at home rehab. Someone would read out words from prescribed lists & I would repeat them back. The lists were designed to teach something different each time. It was about 30 min/day for about 4 months before we gave up and I just started listening to podcasts instead.

Edited

In reply to @bcarp

@bcarp welcome to the forum…
I’m glad you got free surgery, because I sure didn’t… And a lot of US recipients get 2 processors for each ear free….We only ever get 1, if you want another it’s out of your pocket…

I’m surprised you weren’t told about rehab, I had to find all the rehab apps myself in the App Store. Also I heard by word of mouth about the library app to stream book. Podcasts and the library app was my main form of rehab…As I found some of the apps were good for people that couldn’t hear speech or environmental sounds. Other countries get mini mic2, TV streamer, phone clip, aqua kit free in the kit they received.

In reply to @bcarp

@Deaf_piper said:

We poor relations down under get absolutely nothing in the way of 4 gifts. A big fat ZILCH!!!

@bcarp said:

However, we do get free surgery and a free processor with the limited accessories. Well, taxpayer funded really.

Can confirm that’s the extent of the Cochlear loot one gets in Australia. Even if you elect to have it all done via the private system.

In reply to @Raudrive

Rick it is if you don’t have health insurance. We here in Vic have 90,000 people on the public waiting list, all waiting for elective surgery. To get a through the public forum the wait for surgery would be excessively long. All surgery on the public wait list is categorized in degree of urgency. cat 1-4. I would imagine a CI is not life threatening as is cancer. Obviously cat 1& 2 get pushed through quickly as they can. But 3 & 4 can just get dropped off the waiting list after 5 years.

You will always find exceptions to this rule though. Like if you go through a dedicated Eye and Ear hospital, like I did. Even then it was a 2 year wait on the public list when I went through. Hence why I opted to go through health insurance with a 3 month wait.

@Deaf_piper said:

I’m glad you got free surgery, because I sure didn’t… And a lot of US recipients get 2 processors for each ear free….We only ever get 1, if you want another it’s out of your pocket…,

Don’t the US recipients have to pay via health insurance or out of pocket for this? We have Medicare funded surgery, although as you have said rightly, there can be a long wait for this.

I must say though, I’m not sure why I would want a second processor right now. And all those accessories wouldn’t be used either. I have a mini mic 2 only.

To clarify, mine was done through the private hospital system. I paid the excess (deductible) of my insurance plan only. The surgeon and anaesthetist charged no out of pocket fee, and I believe that’s because they are on the list of surgeons who have an agreement with Cochlear Australia. The audiologist has also been free of charge to me via Next Sense. I had assumed this was standard procedure, but it sounds from what you’ve said that it isn’t the case.

@Deaf_piper said:

I’m surprised you weren’t told about rehab,

I was told about rehab. I had very good preoperative counselling. I was told about in person training at home and available apps and streaming, but was told that it would be better to do in person, so that’s what we did and it’s worked well.

A little update on my friend and his new .

It’s been about 18 days since my friend has taken the hearing aid off and used only his new CI.

He has used a phone app and has been calling the Cochlear help phone number mentioned earlier. That and staying active in life. His wife has been a huge support!

His description of how his hearing is doing is “my hearing is slowly getting better, I can have a conversation in a quiet place if I really try”

Reading this puts a big smile on my face. It definitely is a big improvement from where he was at before. At that time all he could hear was screeching and scratching sounds from his CI.

Another little update from my friend.

He just texted me that he can hear salt hitting tin foil.
He’s flat amazed!

That’s great. I am jealous. I am almost 2yrs since activation and all I hear is static but I keep trying. I use the mini mic next to theTV to stream to my . I hear noise but nothing I can make out. Still on the fence about having it removed. not sure if ins. will pay.I see the surgeon and audiologist in Sept. I’ll make my decision then. I am glad your friend had such a good outcome!

@kathykillea04 said:

I use the mini mic next to theTV to stream to my CI. I hear noise but nothing I can make out.

Are the TV speakers making sound when you stream to your ? I ask because you don’t want any sound to anything but your CI, nothing that your good ear can hear.

Are you watching TV shows you are really familiar with? This is very important. You absolutely need to know the words before you hear them. That’s how your brain will know what the new sounds to your CI are.

I apologize if I am pushing you into any pain. It’s not meant that way at all. But…… you do need to really try to train your CI. It not easy but the rewards can be very nice.

My friend reported back to me he got 4 out of 5 words right on the Cochlear phone call rehabilitation test. I remember him saying he got zero at first.

In reply to @kathykillea04

Kathy have you had a company audiologist assist with your mapping? If you haven’t get your to get one in for your next mapping in September. A lot of people I know who have been having difficulty have asked for a second opinion on their mappings. It’s a thought worth trying.

In reply to @Raudrive

@kathykillea04 said:

I use the mini mic next to theTV to stream to my CI. I hear noise but nothing I can make out.

Based on this she is not using the TV streamer, but the mini mic. She is using the speakers from the tv to broadcast to the microphones on the mini mic, then the mini mic to her . This is probably the worst way to do it. Clarity will be awful.

Agreed, not familiar with the mini-mic, thanks.
Too bad she returned the TV streamer.
Using a TV streamer was very helpful for me and you If I remember correctly.

Yep, I have 4 TV streamers! I love them. I even have one at work for my laptop! Super easy, best clarity, and transmit a fair distance.
-On a related note, I just signed up to beta test an Amazon type TV streamer… Although I am not supposed to talk about it. I’ll keep the group posted on how it sounds.

In reply to @Deaf_piper

Have had numerous mappings including 3 done by Cochlear audiologist.Nothing has helped. They tell me to just keep wearing it.They also tell me that they have had other users like me who do not utilize training and all the streaming accessories and have had good results. I don’t buy that for a minute!

In reply to @kathykillea04

@kathykillea04 said:

Still on the fence about having it removed. not sure if ins. will pay.I see the surgeon and audiologist in Sept. I’ll make my decision then.

A person who comes to my Deaf Centre here in the UK, stopped wearing her processors around 4 years ago but still have the implants in her ears. She says she doesn’t need to have the implants removed. She had no benefit from hearing aids and cochlear implants but wanted to try the cochlear implants anyway in case but it didn’t work.

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