What my hearing tests revealed about my hearing

In my very lengthy topic, a few weeks back, which was intended to be an upcoming review of my new audiologist, we got sidetracked into discussing my hearing loss. However, it was clear that a few people were quite interested in the discussion surrounding my hearing loss. So, I thought that I would post the hearing results for your interest. Obviously I will be relying on the new audiologist to program my hearing aids correctly to address what my current shortcomings are. Hopefully her report explains a lot about my hearing.

Audiogram

The audiogram that is listed in my profile is dated 2009 and was done by the NHS. These results below are my audiogram dated 18th February 2026. I will update my profile audiogram once you guys have had an opportunity to compare old and new as they are not identical. I presume that this is down to differences in testing method in the last 15 years etc?

Left Ear

250 - 50
500 - 55
750 - 60
1000 - 55
1500 - 50
2000 - 50
3000 - 65
4000 - 70
6000 - 70
8000 - 80

Right Ear

250 - 45
500 - 50
750 - 55
1000 - 50
1500 - 85
2000 - 75
3000 - 80
4000 - 85
6000 - 70
8000 - 75

Otoscopy and Tympanometry

Tests came back normal. No issues there.

Pure Tone Audiometry

• Left ear: Moderate sensorineural (inner ear) hearing loss
• Right ear: Moderate to moderately-severe sensorineural hearing loss

Notably, the right ear demonstrates significant hyperacusis, with a dynamic range of approximately 15 dB at some frequencies. This narrow dynamic range makes amplification programming more complex, as we must carefully avoid discomfort while still providing speech clarity. The left ear shows a much wider dynamic range.

Speech Descrimination

• Left ear: Good speech discrimination when presented at higher levels (maximum 90% at 85dBHL)
• Right ear: Poor speech discrimination (maximum 47% at 80dBHL)

This indicates that the right ear has reduced clarity potential even when sounds are made loud enough, whereas the left ear performs much more reliably.

Quicksin (Speech in Noise)

• Tested in the left ear only as right ear was unable to cope

Results show mild to moderate difficulty understanding speech in background noise. This aligns with your real-world listening experiences.

Clinical Interpretation

Your hearing profile explains several of the challenges you described:

• The right ear has limited clarity and a very narrow comfortable listening range.
• The left ear is your stronger ear for speech understanding.
• Soft speech is particularly difficult because increasing gain risks discomfort on the right side.
• Prescription formulas (VAC+ vs NAL-NL2) create different trade-offs between clarity and listening comfort.

The positive news is that your current technology platform is highly capable, and there is room to further optimise your fitting.

My own feedback on her tests

I have noticed that her ACN results are missing from her report. I will ask her to follow up on that.

I believe that her UCL tests that she did, probably explains why especially with Vac+, things always sounded louder in the right ear than left ear. It’s because of this hyperacusis where even a small increase in volume makes sound appear very much louder in the right ear than the left ear. I will confirm with her, but this is my understanding of why I experienced this huge volume imbalance between left/right with Vac+ and very much less so with NAL-NL2. Whether she can correct this perfectly with NAL-NL2 I don’t know.

I am hoping that the ACN test where I could not hear the siren at all helps to explain some things about my hearing loss? I really must ask her to include her findings in the report to understand what this tells her. It would be very interesting to hear her take on this point.

Her tone tests are more thorough, testing a lot more frequencies and it shows that my audiogram was never accurate. She has said that REM for me (amongst other things) is essential.

We also discovered that the hearing range in the right ear is really poor - only about 15 decibels of usable range. Her report clearly states that and this is so useful for understanding my hearing loss. I am sure the previous audio also picked this up, but because he never sent a report - I didn’t know, which means I can’t tell people on the forum this information. A report really helps.

The speech discrimination tests as detailed above, really do fill in the blanks for me. How audiologists that only do tone tests ensure good speech comprehension without this test - I will never know! I consider this test to be absolutely essential.

I am really enjoying my new audio. I feel more clued up with what is going on with my ears. Looking forward to the next appointment. Hope this topic is of interest.