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Traveling to see the GOAT of hearing aid fittings for music producers/musicians - worth it?

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I had been looking into flying to see an audiologist that specializes in tweaking settings for musicians/composers and mix engineers that wear hearing aids. His clinic is in Toronto. Dr Marshall Chasin. He charges $2200 (CAN) for initial testing and setup, and tweaking of settings and follow ups for 5 years (which he says can be done remotely via a widex remote accessory). I would supply the hearing aids, from my local provider, which at $5500 USD also included unlimited follow ups with him, however he’s not a musician/producer expert. Chasin doesn’t appear to have a “per visit” rate, although others in NY and La do. I’ve never done this before - has anyone had experience with this kind of package deal? I would essentially be paying close to $7500 for hearing aids with unlimited tweaks and some overlapping service from two sources, without direct experience to draw on. If you google him, you’ll see he’s considered the GOAT in this area, although I haven’t met anyone or heard any specific experiences from anyone here or otherwise that has been fitted by him…so…I’m not sure what to do.

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Sorry but it’s just not worth it, if you had the chance for a first fit at a reasonable rate to try out these settings maybe, but at $2200 to set ones up for music is over the top, would you think it’s money well spent if you can’t get them sounding how you like them, remember hearing aids are just that, an aid and the primary use is for speech.
Unlimited “tweaks” is only so many, like what if you want further adjustments every few weeks, are you going to fly in/out every time? You may never be happy with someone’s else’s settings, bugger it, just stick to and be done with it.

In reply to @tenkan

thanks, yeah…i edited my post after realizing I hadn’t mentioned he would do any tweaks after the initial in person appointment using widex’s remote accessory. I wouldn’t have to make repeated visits to TO. Not sure that changes your thought though

I agree with @tenkan .
Seeing your , makes it even more apparent you can achieve a successful outcome with .
Your loss seems fairly linear, and should not be too great a challenge to tweak.
Remeber too, as @tenkan mentioned, you are not going to get 20 HZ to 20KHZ frequency response ever again with Hearing Aids, but you should be able to at the very least be able to function successfully as a Musician,Producer.

Just thinking out loud - if this is your first pair of , you might want to give it a little more time to adjust to the new way of hearing?? Others can weigh in on this for sure if I am off base. Are you set on your brand or open to trialing others? People tend to have different experiences with different brands - some love and some hate the exact same HA. Food for thought. It is a tough issue for sure with regard to music.

If money isn’t a huge issue, I’m sure you’d learn a lot. $7500 isn’t an unheard of price to pay for a pair of hearing aids and if they’re really optimized well for you, that’s priceless. :>) No one can really make the call for you.

In reply to @joanhawsey

Thanks. I have had the same thought. It is the first. I had my mind set on widex when every professional I knew that wears mentioned them before I did. But trialing is already such a weird process. I think i like their input gain structure and low latency the most

@user172 said:

It is the first. I had my mind set on widex when every professional I knew that wears HAs mentioned them before I did. But trialing is already such a weird process.

If you can, please be patient with new hearing aids. And for what it is worth, name brands really are not that important. Find a fitter and aids that are local. Try to help your fitter with good information about how you hear in different circumstances.

Costco is a great place to start. You can always move on if unhappy but hopefully get educated about what you really need before spending big bucks.

Good luck.

The does help. As others said, your loss is not that complex and seems easily corrected. But, so its mine and I spent a lot of big bucks on different and lots of audiologists and equipment and accessories before finding the combination that works for me. My moderate loss was having a very profound impact on my life and work. Once I finally got the right treatment I quickly recovered all my expenses because I was able to continue working. And, the rest of my life improved too. How much is that worth?

Edited

Have you considered doing the fitting yourself? As a music producer, composer, musician, I do believe you are able to do it just fine on your own. I don’t say this because I have any inherent distrust on audiologists. In my opinion, setting up hearing aids is a very subjective thing that depends on a lot of subjective cues, language, impressions, etc…

I am an amateur/couch guitar player (at most) and was able to design a little system that led me to a great music program, for what I need it at least.

I think you can find a good audiologist that knows about fitting for musicians that also provides hearing aids. I am and have a music program with no compression or sound recover. I agree, you flatter loss is much easier to deal with. The very high frequencies are not coming back because they are out of range for the hearing aids.

Maybe this article is helpful.
Guidelines for Musicians with Hearing Loss to Bring to Their Audiologist.pdf (213.1 KB)

In reply to @user172

Ask these professionals that recommended Widex for Audi recommendations.
Since this is your first experience with hearing aids, you are in for a very complex & subjective process. As I recall, you are comparing the skill and knowledge between a Hearing Instrument Specialist vs a GOAT Audiologist specializing in Musician fittings. Research their credentials, and education required to become vs Audiologist. Look at this like a Business decision.
I would travel in a heartbeat, if it allows you to excel in your profession.
That said, you probably can very effectively - and which person do you want to guide you? Look at this as a business expense / investment.

I guess I’m in the minority as i would totally do it if I was near him. I think the audiologist is more important than the hearing aids. For those of us still in the working world, with hopes of moving up or sometimes even being taken seriously, $2200 CDN would be worthwhile experiment for me. I have done on Sonic and Starkey but since my previous audiologist has retired, the value of a good one is now more obvious to me than ever.

I’m also thinking this could be worth the money. I’m a musician. My audi was clueless about setting up a music program correctly. Mine come with a ‘musicians program’ pre installed, but it simply did not work: lots of warbles, etc. I brought in the pdf mentioned above and walked teh audi AND a Signia audi on the phone through what I needed. The Signia rep too was appalled when I asked to turn off several programs that she treasured as selling point for the aids. They did it, it was simple, and the aids work great for playing now. That said…if the GOAT audi really understands what you need going in, has a lot of experience, and will work with you remotely for further tweaks going forward…it may be worthwhile.

I’m too incompetent and impatient to learn to when it comes to my aids. And fearful of messing things up. Again, I’m happy with what I have and my program was set up for free as part of normal dialing in the new aids that I bought from the provider. But I don’t really know if yet more could be done. Hence…your GOAT may be worthwhile, in part just to learn and assure yourself that you’re getting everything from your aids. Given you’ll be wearing aids from now on, and will eventually get new ones, this experience would also inform you as to what to do then as well.

Getting used to your new aids before going to the GOAT is a good idea. How’s the musician setting now? Did your local audi do a good job?

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