High-Frequency Amplifcation.

[ed121]

If the name of the game is speech comprehension ( it should be that) then certainly there is a possible metric of comprehension for each individual patient with each type of fancy alteration of the input. Where is that metric? Just my opinion. Ed

[cheap hearing aids]

Originally Posted by ed121

Sure would help if the mfg's would present qualified technical papers in the professional journals on these fancy types of signal processing together with scientific quality data on results of real testing on various types of losses.

Lacking that, this old grizzled HOH views this stuff as marketing hype. Ed

You are right Ed, it is all marketing hype.
They are all basically the same reinvent of the wheel.
The best hearing aids are the one's you are happy with.
I have in the past often been asked if a client can try several different aids to compare them against each other. Trouble is, it's self defeating because it takes a while to get used to a hearing aid anyway, so trying to work out the best of three is nei on impossible. Thats why you need an audio you can trust to give you the best information based on your hearing and hearing requirements.

[ed121]

There is no magic about testing a HOH comprehension score with different brands of aids.. But you never see that kind of simple measure published.

Someone asked me what journals I would respect: The Journal of The Acoustical Society of America and The Journal of The Institute of Electronic Electrical Enginneers are truly reliable, truly professional. These journals accept no advertisements and are supported by their membership fees.

Ed (formerly ASA, IEEE now retired)

[dsigismund]

Originally Posted by silent night

Widex use Linear Frequency Transposition called "Audibility Extender"
Phonak use Non Linear Frequency Compression called "Sound Recover"
And Starkey use Spectral Feature Identification called "Spectral iQ"

There can not be lots of ways to improve high-frequency speech/sounds.
One of these techniques MUST be better than the others.

Has any one tried all three types and know which is the better of the three.

Are the manufacturers just jumping on the bandwagon.

It just seems strange to me that all the hearing aid manufacturers CLAIM to have the best technology regarding improving access to high-frequency sounds.

I'm currently trying all three of these aids because "frequency lowering" has worked incredibly well for me in the past few years (I've used Widex Passion 115's that I'm now replacing).

Here are my quick initial impressions. I'll elaborate in much more detail later..

Widex Clear 440: I like these the best so far. I'm also used to their algorithm so I may be unreasonably biased. In noisy environments in particular, I can hear what people are saying, in a way I haven't been able to in 30 years (I'm 34).

Starkey Wi Series: These work great in the quiet setting of an audiology office. They are "smartly" set to detect the right sounds to lower like "s" and "sh" and not the high frequency drone of the refigerator for example. In theory this would work great. Out in the unpredictable real world of sound, it doesn't work so well.

Phonak Audeo Smart IX: These sound "the best" but I don't believe the frequency lowering is actually working. My word score hasn't improved very much and I'm not sure its really doing anything at all. I still need to work on adjusting these with my audiologist so I'll get back to you on these. Its telling that they haven't released a peer reviewed "white paper" like starkey and widex have on their frequency lowering.

Of Note: Frequency lowering sounds strange and distorted no matter which aid you go with. However, for the right kind of hearing loss- mine is great at lowest frequencies and precipitously drops off toward a "severe" loss at the higher frequencies- this feature can do amazing things.

I'll update you on my thoughts as I try all three of these.

Cheers and I hope this info helps others.

David
hearinginformed.org