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Oticon Opn S battery life with iPhone use

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My 91 year old mother in law has the Oticon OPN S aids. She was having trouble hearing during phone calls using her old flip phone so she got an Iphone SE. Now she hears the calls great but she keeps losing the connection on one side or the other. She makes lots of calls so I suspect it’s the batteries. Hard to tell because she is cross country from us and difficult to trouble shoot by phone especially when she can’t hear or understand how to use a smart phone. Tried to explain how to access the hearing device status but no joy. Before the Iphone her batteries lasted about a week. Now maybe 4 or 5 days, I don’t know for sure. Also could just be a problem with the aids but when the Audi checks them they are working fine. I have OPN 1’s but I hardly ever make or receive calls so just don’t know the impact of phone calls on battery life.

Can significant phone usage have that big of an impact on battery life?

Thanks

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Oh BTW, she was on the phone all day today and worked fine until her last call to my wife when she lost audio from the right aid.

I have the OPN, not the OPN S. For normal streaming use (maybe 3 hours a day), my 312 batteries last me around 4 days, sometimes only 3. But I consistently get a low battery warning chime in advance before I lose connection, but sometimes it may only be 10-15 seconds before the hearing aid craps out.

The OPN S may be even a higher drain device, so if she gets 4-5 days with heavy streaming, it seems normal and maybe even better than normal. The battery level indicator in the ON app is notoriously unreliable so I wouldn’t bother counting on it to give you a good indication.

If her OPN S is still under warranty, I would suggest asking her audi to see if they’re willing to do an upgrade of her OPN S to an OPN S R (the lithium-ion rechargeable version). That way she can stream all day long and still wouldn’t worry about the battery life at the end of the day.

Another option is to have her replace batteries before they go bad instead of waiting until they run out of juice. Maybe once every 4 days even if they’re not dead yet. If that’s still not resolving the issue, maybe try every 3 days.

Another question to ask is if she even hears the low battery warning chime? If not, then maybe the audi can turn up the chime volume for her. At least, it’ll help prompt her to replace the battery before it cuts out unexpectedly.

I have different brand . If I hold the phone close to my mouth and then move it to the side, slightly, I might lose the HA on the opposite side. I suspect that the has trouble penetrating my thick skull or the dental plate. That is a WAG. At any rate, moving the phone back away from my face a few inches brings the sound back to both HA’s. Nothing to do with batteries in my case. My 13’s last a week with a lot of streaming.

When her aids are working she just puts the phone on the table. Even still works at a distance if she gets up and walks into the other room. Of course the farther away she gets the farther away from the mic.

When I shifted from the Nera to the Opn S, I went from using 1 set of batteries to 2 sets every week. I’m not currently a heavy streamer however I have noticed in the weeks that I either do stream or make lots of telephone calls that the batteries seem to go a little quicker.
I get occasional instances of one or the other ears disconnecting and a simple off and on with the battery door will fix the connection. You can even do this during a phone call. This doesn’t occur enough for me to think there is an issue, Bluetooth, like all other radio stuff, is not foolproof and I think it is just a quirk of the radio frequency and interference stuff that can occur.
Reliably as the batteries approach the end of their life then the applicable aids will disconnect from Bluetooth, I presume it is doing this to preserve battery life, this will nearly always occur before I get the low battery warning on the phone or the chimes in the ear.
It may be worth checking if your mum’s phone has notifications turned on for the Oticon app. The app alert for low battery seems to be mostly reliable however the percentage stats of the battery in the app is less so. Read any of the figures with a plus or minus 20% ie if it says 30% you are going to be changing a battery within a day but I’ve also had brand new batteries indicate 70%.
My understanding from my research is that the constant Bluetooth connection between the phone and the aids is what chews up the battery life, however I have never bothered to turn off the Bluetooth to test it, as far as I am concerned the improved functionality that I have with the permanently connected aids outweighs the reduction in battery life.
Possibly in the next set I may switch to rechargeable aids but at the moment I’m glad I stayed with the 312 as my usage pattern doesn’t always get me a convenient power point and there are some stories out there about some of the rechargeables doing strange things with the batteries.

When my brother in law visits (sometime soon) he is gonna install the app so she can at least get battery status and also turn on the notification. She is unable to triple tap the home button so good or bad the app will have to do. I believe the most likely cause of her issue are the batteries and she needs to get used to replacing them more often as needed. She still thinks they should last a week like they did before the Iphone. She does like being able to hear phone conversations…

Thanks all.

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