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Unilateral Reverse Slope - trying hearing aid

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I have moderate/severe reverse slope hearing loss in my left ear only from Meniere’s. This is my first try at a . Currently nearing the end of a 30 day trial of a single Starkey Edge 24 HA with a . I have worn the HA all day (12+ hours) since the start of the trial and have made some adjustments as able in the app, plus tried Edge Mode at times. I am struggling to find a benefit.

Frustrations:

  • Occlusion effect/echo of my own voice - I struggle when presenting in or leading meetings and in normal conversations at times
  • Asymmetrical or unbalanced hearing effect of the natural sound in my non-HA ear vs HA sound in other; it’s jarring at times
  • Feels like my HA ear takes over/overpowers my other ear and I am not hearing as well overall
  • Biggest issue: no improvement and seemingly worse at hearing speech where there is background noise - crowds for sure but even minimal background noise and someone at a short distance; background noise seems to take over
    • I ask people to repeat themselves frequently in these situations
    • I would rather take the HA out as I can understand better
    • Example struggle 1: Standing in a parking lot I could not understand my coworker’s question.
    • Example struggle 2: My work office has white noise piped in and I could not hear my coworkers asking for my attention if they were on my HA side; I could hear those on my non-HA side.

Some of this I’m sure is just part of the deal, and perhaps other parts I would get used to in time. Do I try another HA? A different fitter? Any recommendations welcome.

I’ve been told that without keeping the nerves stimulated in my left ear, the brain will turn off processing. Assuming that is true, I do want to find a solution to attempt to keep the hearing I have.

Welcome to the forum @AMRose well a difficult situation I’m sure, but seems to me you need further adjustments to your Edge , although I don’t think you get the full benefits of AI with just one like the Phonak sphere does, yeah so you got a bit of low frequencies (Bass, Booming sounds) coming through because of your loss, you need to tell your fitter what you’ve just said here in your post, of course some of these sounds do need to get used to as you’ve mentioned, but it’s been a month, so a little bit more adjustments could help out, the occlusion would be easier to manage with a custom mold made with the correct size vent, again you need to talk to your clinic soon as you mention the end of the trial period, there’s nothing wrong with trialing another brand to see if you get better results.

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