I used to be able to talk on the phone briefly in the early days when I wore HA - I would take off the HA and talk with the volume at max; it worked for me. Later on while my hearing declined, my phone usage dropped sharply. When I got the CI recently, I was desperate to try out various ways to get back on the phone:
- Use Captel phone (speech to text device) at work to help me get familiar with talking on the phone. I try to avoid reading captions every now and then and listen more attentively. I use Captel for one-on-one conversations with CI on P2 (M/T).
- Use a regular headset on a work phone with high volume booster and my CI set to P2 (M/T). It is clear enough, but can get a little challenging without any captions. I use this for conference calling with 3-4 people. Beyond that, its extremely challenging.
- Use a Blackberry device for personal calls with friends and family. Again no captions here and I am trying to pick up conversations slowly. CI is set on P3 (Focus). Initially my Blackberry would work on Telecoil (P2), but only when my Network status is on 3G. When it drops to EDGE or GPRS, telecoil is a huge mess, so I just avoid it. Maybe I should consider switching to a CDMA carrier like Verizon or Sprint for better sound quality.
It is going pretty alright with the phone, but there are a few challenges:
- If you wear CI and the person at the other end is in a noisy environment, the noise is sensitive, i.e. the CI will pick up the environmental noise at the other person's end.
- If the other person is using a VOIP service, the sound quality can be distorted.
- I have never found the Telecoil useful. And even though I want to buy an iphone or android phone, I cannot because I just cant hear well on them. However, there are people I know who buy neckloops and other accessories to make best use of telecoil on these smartphones. Can be useful I guess.