Which of the following HAs are a good and affordable option for me?

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deafdude1

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I purchased my Phonak Naida V UP 9 months ago. He has been too busy to reprogram my HAs. Also it's been a long time so he isn't obligated to provide any further services. At this point I could seek another audiologist and pay $100 per hour or $200 per HA to have them reprogrammed. Or I can just buy new HAs and use those Naidas as expensive spare HAs.

1. Oticon Sumo DM(very expensive!)
2. Siemens Infinity Pro SP(less expensive)
3. Siemens Rexton HP(less expensive)
4. Siemens LOTUS 23SP(more affordable)
5. Siemens Phoenix 313(more affordable)
6. Siemens LOTUS 13SP(very affordable)

The Siemens have about 138db max SPL(more than enough!) and 78db max gain(hopefully still enough in the lows) does anyone know where I can find a chart/graph for any or all of the above HAs that lists the gains/SPL for different frequencies?

There may be more Siemens models that are suitable for profound hearing loss and are affordable. I will be able to get a great deal/price on the Siemens that ive listed. It is affordable enough that it makes sense to try one HA regardless. If it's equal or better than my Naida, I am buying a 2nd Siemens. I am missing 10-15db of gain/amplification on my Naida.

Do all those Siemens have pots that can be adjusted by the end user to program the gain, SPL and frequencies? If so, that's great since I will be in control of how loud/well I can hear and not some audiologist programming my HA the way he thinks/feels is best for me.

I don't need all those gimmics/features. I just need plenty of amplification so I hear loud enough and my parents quit telling me not to talk so loud. Look at Phi4sius, he hears the best with an affordable analog HA! I very well may hear better with a HA who's features are kept to a minimum as some features that are "supposed" to help actually block out some sounds. That problem happened to Phi4sius!
 
Deafdude,

I would check out the websites for Oticon and Siemens. The websites should have the technical specs. I did come across them for the SUMO DM on the oticon site when I was researching HAs.
 
I've been wearing Oticon HAs since 1985 and have had a great deal of success with them. Not only do they give excellent performance (my Oticon 380Ps were used daily for 15 years without requiring a single repair and still work perfectly to this day) and sound quality.

I know this doesn't answer deafdude's OP, but I thought I'd chime in to share my positive experiences with Oticon.
 
It would probably be best to look at Hearings aids that you CAN afford rather than looking at aids you cannot afford. So look at HA's you can afford and maybe look at the best possible amplification that HA's gives you for that price. You would probably be best at researching more on the internet, asking people their views and maybe contacting a few audiologists to see what they could recommend that would give you better hearing that the phonak naida currently does. i hope this helps
 
I have a Siemens HP model, of which there are several, and mine have no "pots" for consumer adjusting, it has to be done by an audiologist.
 
The only HAs that can be programmed by the user are sold through a company called America Hears. Siemens nor any other brand offer self-programming. As Bott said, it must be done by an audi.
 
Why do you want new HA's when your audi wont give the time to reprogramme your Naida's now, wouldnt you have the exact same problem?
 
I'd like to know why deafdude's audi refuses to program his Naidas. Is it because his audi thinks deafdude won't hear as well as he'd like?
 
I'm just wondering what deafdude is hearing with his Naidas', maybe his audi thinks he's hearing good enough for now?
 
I'm sure audiologist's wouldnt turn down money if they thought a patient did need a turn up
 
DeafLissa90 said:
I'm sure audiologist's wouldnt turn down money if they thought a patient did need a turn up
Click to expand...

You'd be surprised. I had an audi who never programmed my digital Oticons. Instead, he would tell me that my hearing loss was too severe to benefit from digital aids. I don't think he knew what he was doing. Fortunately, I fired him and found another audi who programmed my digitals so that I could hear environmental sounds quite well. By the way, this was the same audi who enabled compression on my digital aids even though I was totally blind. Not a smart thing to do given the fact that I need to be able to hear as many sounds as possible for safe travel.
 
Hmm, it'll be interesting to see deafdude tell us his reasons why his audi would not
 
DeafLissa90 said:
I'm just wondering what deafdude is hearing with his Naidas', maybe his audi thinks he's hearing good enough for now?
Click to expand...

My audiologist has humored all of my programming requests for over a year now. She also thinks that everything is worth a try if it could maybe help me. Most of my requests aren't as crazy has deafdude's though, like hearing speech with a perfectly with a profound hearing loss.
 
JennyB said:
Most of my requests aren't as crazy has deafdude's though, like hearing speech with a perfectly with a profound hearing loss.
Click to expand...

Therein lies deafdude's problem. He often speaks about CI recipients who have unreasonable expectations yet he seems to have the same issue when it comes to his HAs. There's nothing wrong with having the desire to hear better, but someone with a profound loss is NOT going to hear at 20 dB or less.
 
I used to be a bit like deafdude1 in the way I thought that hearing aid technology was superior to cohlear implant for quite some time and I surprised many of my friends with the decision to get a Cochlear implant. One of the many reasons I waiting was the issue that results are not promised and there is no going back to hearing aids if the surgery failed. In my case it took two surgeries to get one CI implant done. While I have a pair of Supero digital aids I prefer to use my Phonak analog SuperFont PP-C-4 aid in my unimplanted ear and it works just great! Each time I have a major map change I can readjust the hearing aid to work better with the CI. I then do not have to borrow the programing equipment from my audi to change the setting on my Supero aids myself.
 
deafdude1 said:
I purchased my Phonak Naida V UP 9 months ago. He has been too busy to reprogram my HAs. Also it's been a long time so he isn't obligated to provide any further services. At this point I could seek another audiologist and pay $100 per hour or $200 per HA to have them reprogrammed. Or I can just buy new HAs and use those Naidas as expensive spare HAs.

1. Oticon Sumo DM(very expensive!)
2. Siemens Infinity Pro SP(less expensive)
3. Siemens Rexton HP(less expensive)
4. Siemens LOTUS 23SP(more affordable)
5. Siemens Phoenix 313(more affordable)
6. Siemens LOTUS 13SP(very affordable)

The Siemens have about 138db max SPL(more than enough!) and 78db max gain(hopefully still enough in the lows) does anyone know where I can find a chart/graph for any or all of the above HAs that lists the gains/SPL for different frequencies?

There may be more Siemens models that are suitable for profound hearing loss and are affordable. I will be able to get a great deal/price on the Siemens that ive listed. It is affordable enough that it makes sense to try one HA regardless. If it's equal or better than my Naida, I am buying a 2nd Siemens. I am missing 10-15db of gain/amplification on my Naida.

Do all those Siemens have pots that can be adjusted by the end user to program the gain, SPL and frequencies? If so, that's great since I will be in control of how loud/well I can hear and not some audiologist programming my HA the way he thinks/feels is best for me.

I don't need all those gimmics/features. I just need plenty of amplification so I hear loud enough and my parents quit telling me not to talk so loud. Look at Phi4sius, he hears the best with an affordable analog HA! I very well may hear better with a HA who's features are kept to a minimum as some features that are "supposed" to help actually block out some sounds. That problem happened to Phi4sius!
Click to expand...

Oticon Sumo isn't expensive at all its cheapest I could find for power aid, like on ebay for DM its 800 bucks and from normal retailer its 1,500. And it have the most max gain (85 db gain) and it focus on your residual hearing.
There is analog version of oticon sumo you can get (XP) from retailer or get one from ebay (DM) and have it programmed like analog and still have feedback cancellation option
I'd not opt for any other one because of their wimpy max gain (70-78) also oticon sumo are tough to break the battery holder stay on very well and hard to open so it won't fall off by accident like wearing helmet for motorcycle and taking helmet off battery fall out (happen all time to my fiance Jason he wear unitron moxi power)
I wore it for about 2 months its not bad at all I can hear part of speech (only few vowel sound complete but all other sound partial or absent) music, only can hear low frequency like bass, not guitar at all and after while I noticed I can't hear that much anymore so obviously I lost even more hearing that any sound higher than low frequency sound like quiet feedback/whistle and low frequency sound quieter so I returned hearing aid and I'm hoping after marrying my fiance and get under his insurance aetna I think then I'll try asking (beg actually) to my surgeon to implant my right ear or go to dupont hospital and see if their other surgeon only do pediatric implant if not I'll ask them to implant my ear and not visiting my current surgeon ever again.
 
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