Secondly, there is a serious accident risk if I just amplify sound on my left side. As an example, try walking safely in a crowded parking lot when you have no ability to hear sounds to your right but hear sounds on your left too loudly.
This may be true for you, but it's not universally true. I was born with SSD and while it's certainly true that you have to be aware of your surroundings, I have never once been in a situation where my SSD put me at greater risk for injury etc. People walking in a parking lot, crossing the street etc need to keep their eyes open and be alert for dangers regardless of their hearing - I (and most Hoh/Deaf people I know) see dangers long before they hear them, because (if responsible) we're so much more aware of our environments.
Bottom line for me is that I could not imagine how I would have survived all of these years without a BioCros. I am a corporate management trainer which requires me to be able to function at a high listening level in classrooms and tough acoustical settings. The BiCros saved my career when the bilateral Menieres hit me.
You would have survived in a similar manner to the hundreds of thousands of people who have SSD, or are unilaterally implanted with a CI etc. It's also worth mentioning that in general people find that BAHAs actaully work BETTER than CROS and BiCROS aids in many situations (the latter dependant on the amount of hearing on the hoh/more hearing side). Additionally - it's important to understand that CROS and BiCROS HA work much better for those who where born with normal or near normal hearing and then lost all/almost all hearing in one ear as young adults/later in life due to an accident/illness etc while retaining all/almost all hearing in the other ear. Those born with SSD, or severe/profound HL onone side & normal/mild HL on the other typically
do not benefit from CROS/BiCROS HAs to anywhere near the same degree as those who are LD.
I am sorry if this may sound a bit harsh, but no hearing professional should ever try to steer someone away from a possible solution regardless of what their own experience might be. Frankly, as someone who has counseled hundreds of HOH folks over the years I would be a complete fool to let them give on on any aid just because getting used to it takes patience. Change bothers everyone, but life goes on, so eventually you have to embrace the change anyway.
While I agree to some extent, on the other hand BiCROS (and CROS for that matter) really only benefit a small number of potential candidates and there are other options which tend to work better for more people. While "making sure someone knows all the options" is important, it's equally, if not more important to make sure that people understand that some options are "available" but generally do not work (there's always a few exceptions that prove the rule).
In my case, I was born with SSD, which became 120+db hearing loss on my right (completely deaf) as well as mild/moderate fluctuating hearing loss on my left as well as Auditory Processing Disorder (APD) ... While I could technically use a CROS (now BiCROS) HAs due to my specific hearing loss, the way I process sounds etc it simply doesn't work - in fact it makes my sound discrimination worse (not an entirely uncommon outcome).
I'd be a candidate for a BAHA (unilateral or bilateral) which would almost certainly be a much better form of amplification/sound management than the CROS/BiCROS ... however I'm not really keen on the idea - even though it's a very very minor surgical procedure (nothing close to as invasive as CI).
For me, the thing that works is using a HA (BTE) on my mild/mod side (with adjustable volume to accommodate the "flux") which is actually over-amplified for what would be typical amplification for the HL on that side. For me, that is the best result - it's not a typical option (however it's actually becoming more common for those in similar situations to mine ie congenital SSD with additional post-lingual HL on the 'hearing side' as well as APD/CAPD etc).
I'm glad that you're BiCROS HA works for you ... however from the dozens of people who have tried BiCROS I only know 2 or 3 (including yourself) who've found it was the right strategy for them and kept it for more than a year or two.
DARN - suckered into another Dredged Thread
Although I was posting to the person who dredged it ... so I suppose that makes a difference
