Starkey Brand?

[Gina]

Hello,
I have just begun to assist my father in a search for his first hearing aid and am overwhelmed by the manufacturers/types/features available!! We had a preliminary visit today and my father has mild hearing loss in both ears and demonstrates difficulty with high pitched sounds as well as consonants and such, which makes his hearing mumbled at times. The office which we visited recommended a Starkey 200 hearing aid as his best fit. In researching various hearing aid manufacturers I found that the Starkey was among the best, included on a list with Siemens, Phonak, and Electone to name a few. Does anyone out there have experience with the Starkey brand, and if so, could you provide some feedback to give me some direction.

[xbulder]

the top hearing aid manf. by market share are
1-siemens
2-Oticon
3-Phonak (very close)
4-GN resound
5- Starkey

In the mid price segment... most products across most manf. are very similar (if not identical), so if you have a good fitter starkey could be a good choice.

[ebrose]

In researching various hearing aid manufacturers I found that the Starkey was among the best, included on a list with Siemens, Phonak, and Electone to name a few.

Electone is owned by Siemens and uses genuine Siemens circuitry, however the price of Electone is a lot less... especially if you purchase through a discount dealer.

[buck]

Market share does not always mean quality. Starkey is the last American company and right now has the best technology in the world. In the last quarter I believe only two hearing aid companies saw an increase and Starkey was one of them and Phonak the other. Their technology is used in Starkey, NuEar, Audibel and Micro Tech. I wish we could all have a "Fit Off" using our best products on random people and see who they would pick. I believe a lot of foreign brands would go bye bye. Start with one of these brands and you will probably be really happy if your fitter knows what they are doing. When 33% of all hearing aids dispensed are of this technology something must be good. Good luck. Keep us posted. By the way, the 200 is the entry level product.

[xbulder]

Market share does not always mean quality. Starkey is the last American company and right now has the best technology in the world. In the last quarter I believe only two hearing aid companies saw an increase and Starkey was one of them and Phonak the other. Their technology is used in Starkey, NuEar, Audibel and Micro Tech. I wish we could all have a "Fit Off" using our best products on random people and see who they would pick. I believe a lot of foreign brands would go bye bye. Start with one of these brands and you will probably be really happy if your fitter knows what they are doing. When 33% of all hearing aids dispensed are of this technology something must be good. Good luck. Keep us posted. By the way, the 200 is the entry level product.

wrong.. sonic innovations is an american company..

[acc716]

I recently purchased an Electone for my mild hearing loss. It works great and the cost was under $200.00. I don't know how it would work for severe hearing loss, but I can definately say that I am very pleased with it.

[xbulder]

what model?

[acc716]

The EL 111

[KayakerNC]

I recently purchased an Electone for my mild hearing loss. It works great and the cost was under $200.00. I don't know how it would work for severe hearing loss, but I can definately say that I am very pleased with it.

Did you purchase your EL-111 online, or locally?
The Electone website doesn't list any "where to purchase" information.

[Gale]

wrong.. sonic innovations is an American company..

And you can add America Hears out of PA. I ordered my late Friday and expect them Tue or Wed how ever they are leading edge technology and cost a little over $1000 each but you can get the equipment for $149 and program them in your home or office by yourself or log in and where one of their fitters makes the adjustments over the web and updates your aids as you are wearing them so you can approve any changes before they are saved to your aids.

If you can find something for $200 that will work for you that would seem to be a good deal. America Hears compares to local sources charging 250% to 300% more. I had decided to get digital so I did not look at any of the analog versions.