Phonak sound recovery

@Um_bongo said:

You’re right that it doesn’t work for everybody, but you wouldn’t implement it for everybody. The suggestion that the signal becomes distorted is flawed too.

I’m not a big fan of Phonak per se, but I would suggest that an advancement like Soundrecover does way more good in than it ever does harm.

If you don’t like it, you just turn it off.

However, there is an ethical point here, especially wrt paediatric fittings - Should children be exposed to a proprietary form of acoustic modification, which although largely beneficial may mould their neural pathways in a particular fashion - thereby indoctrinating them into a particular manufacturer’s products for life.

I’ve never suggested that Sound Recovery was for everybody. My point was that for fittings where Phonak’s frequency compression was considered appropriate, the results have been mixed.

Your statement that getting a portion of the frequency spectrum and shifting it by a set amount and then mixing it back into the original signal will not result in distortion is a startling one. In what way is this true?

“If you don’t like it, you just turn it off.” Boy that audiological degree really comes in handy, thanks for the tip!

I don’t do pediatric fittings but I would think that the fitter should be somewhat careful. I would expect that it is best to err on the conservative side. What I generally do with my adult fittings is reduce (make less active) the soundrecover setting 1 step from what is recommended by phonak. Than I evaluate live speech with REM concentrating on high frequency sounds such as “f” “s” and “t”. If they are all audible and distinguishable I may even reduce soundrecover further. My general opinion is that sound recover should be used to improve audibility but not at the expense of altering the sound of things in a very unnatural manner. It can always be turned up later if the client comes back complaining that certain sounds are difficult to hear. I have also trialed different settings for soundrecover in manual programs in the past so that the wearer can experiment with greater/lesser degrees of soundrecover and see which setting they prefer.

@dsi1 said:

I’ve never suggested that Sound Recovery was for everybody. My point was that for fittings where Phonak’s frequency compression was considered appropriate, the results have been mixed.

I know you didn’t, I was just suggesting that, like other features, there was a question of candidacy and suitability, which would mean that you wouldn’t even think about using it in lots of cases.

@dsi1 said:

Your statement that getting a portion of the frequency spectrum and shifting it by a set amount and then mixing it back into the original signal will not result in distortion is a startling one. In what way is this true?

You’re confusing frequency compression with frequency transposition, there is no mixing with an original signal - the whole signal becomes compressed in the higher frequencies.
It’s obviously less effective the more open the fitting, but that’s just logical.

@dsi1 said:

“If you don’t like it, you just turn it off.” Boy that audiological degree really comes in handy, thanks for the tip!

My original study was in Electro-Mechanical Engineering not Audiology. So, yes, turning off a feature that is upsetting the desired result is a completely valid step in determining a better outcome. Moreso using a objective outcome measure like Real Ear Measurement combined with subjective loudness scaling from the patient is likely to yeild far more accurate results than say for example, stuffing an aid in your own ear.

Thanks. UB

With my Ambras, I have noticed in a noisy environment, like a car or an airplane, a distorted sound in the background. It sounds like rain on a tin roof. It is not continuous, but accompanies someone when they are speaking. It seems to be more pronounced in StereoZoom and AutoZoom. I have turned down the highs, but that makes no difference. I wonder whether it comes from SoundRecover. If so, can it be adjusted out?

Next adjustment, I am going to turn SoundRecover off and see if it goes away.

@Um_bongo said:

children be exposed to a proprietary form of acoustic modification, which although largely beneficial may mould their neural pathways in a particular fashion

This is a very important point. This gives all the more reason to turn off the feature for children in their initial fitting and only turning the feature on when absolutely necessary.

@dsi1 said:

The higher frequencies are compressed AND shifted AND combined with the original signal.

Seems like you are describing frequency transposition which sound recovery does not do. It does frequency compression. Widex I believe are the only manufacturer with aids that have the ability to shift and combine signals. Phonak is just compressing all the frequencies above a certain threshold. It’s a poor man’s frequency transposition scheme.

@Neilk said:

All I’m saying is that despite what everyone claims is impossible … in my humble opinion works GREAT for me.

If I were you I would definitely try out the widex’s aids. They do something completely different than the phonak in that they move entire sound waves to a lower frequency without changing the existing sounds in the lower frequencies.

The aid that started all this was called the impact avr. that aid compressed all sounds to fit a range the user can hear in. However, this aid was only useful for a very select few. But the few who were able to use them apparently had tremendous success. This is probably why phonak and widex decided to adopt this technology.

@doubledown said:

This is a very important point. This gives all the more reason to turn off the feature for children in their initial fitting and only turning the feature on when absolutely necessary.

Seems like you are describing frequency transposition which sound recovery does not do. It does frequency compression. Widex I believe are the only manufacturer with aids that have the ability to shift and combine signals. Phonak is just compressing all the frequencies above a certain threshold. It’s a poor man’s frequency transposition scheme.

If I were you I would definitely try out the widex’s aids. They do something completely different than the phonak in that they move entire sound waves to a lower frequency without changing the existing sounds in the lower frequencies.

The aid that started all this was called the impact avr. that aid compressed all sounds to fit a range the user can hear in. However, this aid was only useful for a very select few. But the few who were able to use them apparently had tremendous success. This is probably why phonak and widex decided to adopt this technology.

My apologies if I have been handing out mis-information about Phonak’s Sound Recover. I got my info at Phonak’s site and if this article is wrong, I suppose they ought to remove it:

http://www.phonak.com/content/dam/phonak/b2b/C_M_tools/Library/Features/SoundRecover/en/NLFC_boosts_speech_intelligibility_HJ_Dec08.pdf5

Tiny url:

http://tinyurl.com/5wm2mxh1

Thanks again.

@Neilk said:

For everyone’s fancy talk and all their knowledge and how Phonak’s SoundRecover can’t possibly work and how all the brains out there know that it will distort sounds … you are all full of crap! But then, what do I know, I’m deaf! I just know that it works for me, and NO, nothing sounds distorted to me, despite everyone with advanced knowledge and fancy college degrees saying no way. But again, I’m deaf and probably would not know what distorted sounds like … I do know however that I can hear better than ever before, better than with my two previous sets of aids, and I can hear and understand women with high pitched little girl voices, and I can hear mumblers (and I mean ones who my wife with perfect hearing has a hard time understanding), and none of them sound distorted to me. Of course, I am hearing impaired due to noise damage from having worked in aerospace for many years, and old … and probably at my age forgot what normal even sounds like.

All I’m saying is that despite what everyone claims is impossible … in my humble opinion works GREAT for me.

Personally, I think that SoundRecover is a great and clever idea but it’s not for everyone. You’re mistaken if you think that’s not a true statement.