Once in a while it's nice to receive validation.

Yesterday I received a very nice email from a new patient, as a response to a routine audiologic report I sent to him:

"...The pleasure was all mine.  What a refreshingly pleasant experience dealing with someone who took a sincere interest in the important aspects of my health.  You should patent how you treat patients.  It was clear that I was your single focus, and that you were going to do whatever you needed to do in order to understand and help me with my issues. I assure you that if I ever learn of anyone who has a hearing related concern, I will recommend you, and only you to be the first person they work with. I just wish I could do more.  I'm not sure I will end up going the hearing aid route at this time.  But, if I ever do, you are my man."

Lesson: Keep following the "Golden Rule"

Hearing aids don't get showers.

Most of the time human hearing is more stable than hearing aid performance. That's because humans take showers to get clean but hearing aids never do. So imagine a hearing aid, day in and day out, that never gets cleaned. It sits in 98.6 degrees (the ear), with heat, body oils, cerumen (wax), and humidity. It builds up over time and the end result is that utimately debris will find a way to get into the hearing aid, the earmold, the microphone, etc. In my experience, 90% of the time when a patient says "my hearing aid just quit working" it's due to blockage some kind. Once a microphone or speaker is blocked the sound quality and speech intelligibility with a hearing aid can be significantly reduced or stop, altogether.

Lesson: Hearing aids need maintenance on a regular basis. They never get showers.

Basic principles to consider when fitting a hearing aid.

Today there is more science and research into the fitting of digital hearing aid technology than ever before. In order for a successful fitting, several steps and variables must take into account in order to optimize the benefits of wearing a hearing aid:
1.  The proper diagnosis of the hearing loss, including assessment for auditory neuropathy.
2.  The appropriate selection of the model. technology, and features of the hearing aids.
3.  The proper measurement and adjustment (programming) of the hearing instruments to the            loss.
4.  The fit of the ear mold/s (often times this can be the weakest link of the fitting).
Other factors to be considered are: patient's expectations regarding the use of hearing aids, their committment to use them full-time, age, degree and type of loss, cognition, short-term memory, auditory neuropathy, type of environments the patient lives and works.
I often say to my new patients that "the fitting of a hearing aid is not like buying a television or a toaster". It involves adaptation to a digital electronic instrument pumping sound through a damaged ear in order to make certain speech sounds more audible. What the brain does with this sound takes time to adapt.

Ah...you're gonna need a bigger boat...er...screen.

In the first few days of using the new technology I noticed that a few of my patients had visual problems and were having some problems seeing the smaller monitory. So after some research I found the answer by installing (5 hours later) a 47" LCD flat screen monitor on the wall (click on the small picture). The difference is that almost all of my patients can see what their hearing aids are doing on the big screen.

Who's the guy in the funny glasses?

He's my new poster boy to celebrate the arrival of my new Audioscan Verifit Hearing Aid Fitting System!

As you'll see below I've invested in the latest hearing instrument fitting system to better serve my hearing aid patients. The Verifit allows me to show patients exactly what they're getting with new hearing aid technology. It can even replicate the frustrating sounds of your hearing loss. Digital hearing aids need to be fit/tested with using a Verifit and currently I am the only practitioner in North County who has the latest from AudioScan. I am both proud and excited to have this latest gold standard in hearing aid fitting technology to provide my patients with the best service and quality of fit. More information to come.

 

AudioScan Verifit 2011