Hearing Aids

Hey @SamRosemary, I just wanted to ask you how the hearing aids are going for you? Do you have reactive/sound sensitive tinnitus at all?

 

Sadly, I haven’t given them much of a chance. I still have them for a couple more weeks and I will try to devote time to trying them - but it just feels like another thing I have to try to fit into my life and, the couple times I did manage to use them, they annoyed me so much and it did seem to cause my left ear to react. My left ear seems to be the most reactive, but only sometimes and to certain noises.

 

I’ve had hearing aids for 3 1/2 years with no improvement in my tinnitus. I only ever went to have my hearing tested because I had chronic bilateral tinnitus. I was found to have some hearing loss at high frequencies which wasn’t surprising as I’d worked in factories my entire life. The theory behind getting the hearing aids was that once I was hearing high frequency sounds ‘for real’ my brain would adjust and no longer focus or create the high pitched ringing I was hearing 24/7. This hasn’t proven to be the case and of late I think the level of my tinnitus has increased.

Yesterday I visited my hearing clinic and with no testing whatsoever they have suggested a new you beaut invisible hearing aid which stays in the ear canal for months at a time and is reportedly great for tinnitus sufferers. Great but this device is sold on a subscription basis only, at a cost of (Australian) $220 per month per ear. Looks like I won’t be trialling that lol. Much as I’d love to knock a dent in the impact that tinnitus causes me, the price is beyond me.

Today I’ve ordered a LLLT device which at $770 was much more affordable and sounds like has some level of success for some people.

Not discouraging you to go down the hearing aid route, just sharing my experience. This may also be a generalisation but also in my experience I have yet to find a hearing clinic that looks beyond their own interests.

 

Hey Bob,

Sorry for the late post. I have had Signia Go with notched technology for a year and it hasn't helped my tinnitus at all. In fact, my tinnitus has gotten worse, which I attribute to anxiety and an inability to get used to these intensely annoying noises.

What I have liked about the hearing aids is that they help my hearing in the 5 kHz region of my left ear, which is my only real hearing loss (though above 8 kHz isn't great).

They also are nice as I stream music to help take my mind off of the tinnitus. I'd go nuts, otherwise.

Several doctors have suggested I use antidepressants to adjust to this horror show, but I don't want to make it worse, so the hearing aids really help me to cope.

I hope that helps in some way.

 

2 years ago, I purchased a pair of Phonak P50 Audeo hearing aids. They have substantially reduced the ringing in my ears. I don't know if the type of hearing aid matters or not. You will know within the first 10 minutes of using them if it will work or not. Make sure you buy the pair and not just one hearing aid. One hearing aid does nothing.

 

That's great news @Anthony2019, and thank you for posting your positive experience. I would think that anything that improves our ability to hear white/pink noises or other background sounds can only help w/ our tinnitus. But one just has to try it and see, we're all human, but we're all different too.

 

Hi -- I started having loud, intermittent tinnitus, mostly in my left ear, about three months ago after my COVID-19 booster.

I'm trying "sound therapy" with Widex Zen behind-the-ear maskers to try to habituate.

But I wonder if amplifying hearing aids would be more helpful.

My hearing is within normal range in both ears (at least up to 8000 Hz), but my left ear threshold is about 10 dB lower than my right at 8000 Hz, so it's quite possible I have some high frequency hearing loss in it.

Has anyone with "normal" hearing tried amplifying hearing aids?

Would love to hear your experiences, since they're quite pricey. Thanks in advance.

 

Some people say this and others say you need to wear hearing aids for a while for them to work.

Would it be possible to set up an online question for this?

Something like:

I have used hearing aids, and they are benefiting me.

A) The benefit was perceptible within less than 30 minutes of me using them.

B) The benefit was perceptible after 30 minutes and before 1 week of using them.

C) The benefit was not perceptible until after 1 week of using them.

If the answer is A) in the majority of cases, I think this will be useful information. You could try them in the clinic and make a decision on their usefulness before committing to purchase/trial them.

 

An online question would be good. I would add:

D) What was your hearing loss before using hearing aids?

I think it has to be at least moderate to severe for the hearing aids to help.

 

D) The benefit lasted only for a while.

 

For your interest. Not necessarily a recommendation! See your ENT first anyway.

Lidl are flogging hearing aids --- they call them hearing amplifiers, not hearing aids --- for the price of 10 EUR each. For you out Stateside, that would come to circa 18.50 USD for the pair.

In the instructions leaflet, they recommend that you start using them at the lower level and work your way up to what is optimum for you.

I bought a pair today and will give them a try to see if they help my tinnitus.

My hearing is OK except that I can't stand loud noise much.

I'll let you know how I get on.

Sanitas Hearing Amplifier costs 10 EUR for each one, so that would be 20 EUR for a pair. The maker is Hans Dinslage GmbH. I had never heard of the firm myself.

 

I did TRT with continuous sound therapy using hearing aids. They thought I had minor hearing loss at first, but it tested normal later. My audiologist allowed for minor amplification of the environment, which was helpful. I tried many noises, but white noise worked the best for me long term. You can use anything you like, really. The hearing aids stream Bluetooth easily now, so you can find what you like and then see if the audiologist can tune to something like that.

I found the noise generator in the hearing aids better than streaming any sound (and easier on battery life).

I used Siemens for my first set, which became Sivantos for my second set. My first set still works, but I wanted a backup. Both have advantages, but the second set doesn't need a pendant for Bluetooth.

On the first set, I've slept with them for years and never had any issues. No audiologist is going to tell you that's officially OK but they may tell you they have patients that do - and I did.

I haven't used them much for several years now, but when I need them, it takes a little getting used to again then I'm good. TRT and the hearing aids with the therapy signal worked for me. It took a while and a lot of effort, as I'm sure most of you know... I still have tinnitus, but it's manageable, and I'm already tired of talking about it again, but I hope this helps some people decide on what to do.

 

I am pleased that you are in a much better place managing your tinnitus @DanielN, which you have had for quite some time. I believe your diligence, patience, and stalwart attitude have played a significant part in you being able to have a better quality of life living with this condition.

Well done and take care,
Michael

 

Or maybe—just maybe—he didn't have reactive tinnitus or hyperacusis to a degree that would have worsened by listening to more sounds. Thankfully, the level of sound therapy, aka TRT, didn't further damage or fatigue his auditory system. Auditory damage adds up. Don't add to it. Rest is best for some people with damaged auditory systems.

It doesn't matter what you think if you get bad enough damage. Positivity won't help you go outside or be able to carry on. Contain your damage.

Sound therapy and TRT are only able to be used by people with a lower level of damage. Once tinnitus is spiking to sounds, do not be exposed to anything that spikes you. Rest and no medications have helped a lot of people sustain life, whereas exposure to more sound and medications has worsened many to suicide.

So please be careful, my friends.

If you just developed tinnitus from a sound exposure, research and see if you should seek steroid injections to calm the inflammation.

I feel had I gone to time and quiet in 2022 when I first got my damage, I would have successfully lived a quiet life.

All sounds can become damaging, and tinnitus has no limit. Please do damage control. It is all we got.

 

Hearing aid didn't work for me at all. I only have moderate hearing loss in my left ear at worst, but it's the incredibly rare low-mid loss. My mid-highs are almost above the audiogram, and my highs are great for someone nearly 40 who has blasted loud music into their ears frequently for well over 20 years (I do not do this anymore and never will again)

When I say it "didn't work," I mean it didn't work to help me hear anything. I struggle with the left side (like speech), and even high-frequency stuff (where I have no loss) sounded worse than going without. It also didn't help with the tinnitus, but NOTHING is going to help with that shit, as in addition to having reverse slope hearing loss, I also suspect I have reverse hidden hearing loss also. I hear at 45-ish dB from 250 Hz - 1.5 kHz, according to my latest audiogram, which is not bad enough for the extreme level of tinnitus I have. My tinnitus is not at 250 Hz or any of the other frequencies I have lost in; it's lower than that, maybe between 100-150 Hz, and it alternates between electric buzz/roaring wind/seashell to the ear noise. If I were measured between 20 - 200 Hz, I'd be at a profound loss. Hearing aids don't amplify sound at those frequencies, and they were my last realistic hope for help. I don't even think a cochlear implant would help as even they are designed with high frequencies in mind.

Outside of an actual cure for hearing loss that would work for very low frequencies, I'm fucked.

 

Are your losses conductive or sensorineural? Have you ruled out otosclerosis?

 

The audiologist said there was a slight conductive loss but mostly sensorineural. Otosclerosis would be all conductive and gradual, while mine was very sudden. Initially I lost the highs too, after 4 kHz I dropped to 50 dB but those frequencies came back to normal while the lows and mid-lows remained at a moderate loss.

I'm thinking more along the cochlear hydrops route but I have never had any vertigo, fluctuations in tinnitus or low tone hearing. Outside of it being low-frequency loss, I just don't follow any pattern.

 

This is generally the rule indeed, but I am proof that it doesn't always follow this pattern. In my case, it first presented as SNHL as well, not conductive, and the doctors thought hydrops. Then, within a couple of months, I developed a large air-bone gap.

It doesn't mean that's what you have, but perhaps some more digging would be helpful. I had to show my CT scan to quite a few doctors before finding one that would detect radiolucencies in it.

 

My left ear does have a little bit of an air-bone gap, but no ENTs have remarked on it. I am nearly six months post-loss and have had several audiograms at this point. No one has ever been interested in my hearing loss. I didn't even know it was an unusual loss; I found that out on my own.

I wish I did have it, to be honest. It seems it can be improved by surgery.

 

Did you get a hi-res CT scan done?

I understand what you mean when you say no one is interested in your hearing loss: it took me persevering through close to a dozen doctors who were all parroting the same stuff that predecessors had written (they looked into my medical file and I guess "found their answers" in there). Then I found a doctor who told me something along the lines of "Bring me the images, and I'll analyze them myself; I don't need the radiologist's blurb." And he found what nobody else did. In retrospect, that is probably the way to go, as it removes the biases from other doctors.

When it comes to your health, you have the most incentive out of everyone on this earth, so you have to drive - sometimes annoyingly - to get answers. Others won't care as much as you do.

Good luck!