The best hearing aid to date (2023 February)

I wonder whether there is something unintentionally misleading about presenting the initial fit sound clips this way. They were measured with a relatively ideal physical fit in an average sized kemar ear, no? But it is often the individual ear acoustics/venting that makes an initial fit inappropriate, and which might dramatically increase the differences between an initial fit and a tuned fit.

Although I’d generally agree that picking a “Best of” anything is likely pointless, I think it does make sense if one is picking specific characteristics which I think is what Abrams is doing. IF one wants a rechargeable hearing aid and wants the longest battery life, Resound is best (along with comparable Beltone and Jabras). If one wants near universal BT connectivity without an ancillary device NOW, regardless of battery life, Phonak is best. These are pretty objective. The question of which hearing aid is best for me (or you) is a whole different ballgame.

One thing that stands out to me comparing initial fit to fitted is that the initial fit always has a better feedback score suggesting that initial fit is underfit.

Yes, I thought the same.

I’m not sure how useful the own voice measure is. I can see that they are trying to capture something about, say, Signia’s OVP or the occlusion inherent to using AirPods as OTC hearing aids, but it’s just such a variable issue.

HA_Whitepaper010623 (1).pdf (471.7 KB)

Thanks for the support @MDB ! I thought that made the most sense too…

Also, we of course included a section about individual differences.

to early to say …

Oticon just released a new instrument

Starkey is coming with something new 27th feb…

Other will follow for sure… this could be interesting year

Universities are great places to find hearing health care the two main things are generally busy - they are generally booked, have very limited time. The good news is that they follow best practices tend to have very high standard

Speaking of which my colleague was a patient got sick of not finding a suitable Audi and he decided to go to school and become one

When you’re comparing hearing aids from the traditional manfs this is true (the fitter means more than the product), but when you expand to products outside of the big 5 you start to see significant differences between products. Also some big 5 products do perform better than others when fitted well. These are some of the findings from the lab.

Thanks all. I am now driving home with my new Oticon More 1 aids. @SpudGunner would be proud. So far, some high sounds are especially sharp but overall better than my Rexton aids.

@prodigyplace said:

SpudGunner would be proud.

@prodigyplace: You’ll need to buy a grease pencil and print “Just Oticoned” on the rear of your vehicle.

I don’t know if I’ve missed it, but it could be useful to see what tip the manufacturer recommended/used for initial fit, and which tip was used for the tuned fit.

We actually have all this data. Will ask for it.

BTW, you can now listen to audio samples for a number of hearing aids45 on our comparison pages. Just look for the little speakers that indicate which comparison pages include audio samples for one or both products.

The sound comparison clips were really interesting in that you get to hear how each of the manufacturers deal with noise, speak in quiet, music, etc. The samples actually confirmed my complaints about music on some of these hearing aids. I compared Lumity to Oticon More and was surprised how aweful music sounded on Oticon. Zero bass and very tinny, etc.

All good info.

Jordan