Hearing Analysis

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C-NICE

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My Scanner never seems to work these days so this will be a transciption of a letter from my doctor detailing my present and possible future hearing situation.
Febuary 2, 2009

Dear Patient

Per your request, I am writing to review our telephone conversation for our records. I have reviewed your hearing test dating back to 1997 at Kaiser. Since that time, you have lost an average of 14 decibels of hearing in the right ear and 19 decibels of hearing in the left ear. Your right ear hearing has been worse than the left all along, but the two ears are closer together than before. Your speech descimination(ability to understand words even if they are loud enough for you to hear) has decreased from 88% to 68% in your left ear and from 84% to 64 % in your right ear. This means that, even with your hearing aids, you may not always hear words clearly.

I also had your MRI report from 1995 which showed no problems with the hearing nerves or the brain to explain your hearing loss. This does not need to be repeated.

I recommend that you have a follow up hearing test in about two years, and plan to see me at that time to compare with your recent one her. That may give us a better idea how fast you hearing is declinning I also recommend that, when your are able, you consider getting a new hearing aid for the right ear. The technology has improved a lot since 2001, and this may overcome some of the difficulties you have been noticing recently.

If your hearing continues to decline(which I expect it will, though it is impossible to say how fast), a time may come when hearing aids will no longer helpf you. At that point, you may be a candidate for a cochlear implant. This is certainly years away from now.

Please let mew know if your have any questions. It was a pleasure to meet you and your wife.

sincerly

Catherine Heny, MD, FACP
 
Cleveland Clinic

My work up was done at the Cleveland Clinic in Cleveland OH. I am a native of north east OHIO-Go Browns
 
C-NICE said:
I also had your MRI report from 1995 which showed no problems with the hearing nerves or the brain to explain your hearing loss. This does not need to be repeated.
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Ok so you don't have auditory processing disorder, you just don't have proper, up to date HAs.

I recommend that you have a follow up hearing test in about two years, and plan to see me at that time to compare with your recent one her. That may give us a better idea how fast you hearing is declinning.
Click to expand...

Try wearing HAs less. Don't wear them when you are home alone or in situations where you don't need to hear. Someone in another thread said that HAs make hearing worse faster.

I also recommend that, when your are able, you consider getting a new hearing aid for the right ear. The technology has improved a lot since 2001, and this may overcome some of the difficulties you have been noticing recently.
Click to expand...

So that explains why your speech scores are low for the degree of loss you have. If you get proper HAs and have them programmed properly with as much amplification as possible(but not more than your HL, say 50db loss, then don't get more than 50db gain) your speech scores will shoot up like a rocket! :D

If your hearing continues to decline(which I expect it will, though it is impossible to say how fast), a time may come when hearing aids will no longer help you. At that point, you may be a candidate for a cochlear implant. This is certainly years away from now.
Click to expand...

Years away from now, stem cells can partially restore your hearing. I know what a big fan you are of CIs. You make 5 posts about CI everyday. I want to let you know that a CI will give hearing similar to someone with 80db HL wearing the best HAs. It won't come close to what you currently hear. Ill be getting stem cells because I want to hear my best. Your choice if you want CI, im choosing stem cells.
 
Just Got New Digital aids

I just got new digital aids(Oticon Hit Pro) from Vocational rehabilitation commission. Also there is evidence my loss is hereditary(my mother had a hearing loss that she refused to discuss and she died young so it is not known how fast or far it would have gone). My loss is progressive, I have no problems with stem cells but can anyone say at this point when exactly sooner or later they will be available. I have to consider all options open to me. As to what is going on in other countries who is to say considering the money involved they are not buttering people's bread a little with stories of such success? I also have to depend on my hearing for my career(I work in customer service/tech support and spend hours on the phone) so anymore loss could effect my employment. I better stop now becoming a rant and dont want to do that.
 
Genetic testing might give you a better idea of where you are headed. I believe the Clev Clinic does the testing you need, although I'm not sure if your insurance will cover it.
 
Thank You I will look into it

Thank You I will look into it.
 
C-NICE said:
I just got new digital aids(Oticon Hit Pro) from Vocational rehabilitation commission. Also there is evidence my loss is hereditary(my mother had a hearing loss that she refused to discuss and she died young so it is not known how fast or far it would have gone). My loss is progressive, I have no problems with stem cells but can anyone say at this point when exactly sooner or later they will be available. I have to consider all options open to me. As to what is going on in other countries who is to say considering the money involved they are not buttering people's bread a little with stories of such success? I also have to depend on my hearing for my career(I work in customer service/tech support and spend hours on the phone) so anymore loss could effect my employment. I better stop now becoming a rant and dont want to do that.
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Ok, how much did new HAs improve your speech scores? Did the audiologist give you a new audiogram(unaided and aided?) I don't see anything to worry about your progressive loss as long as you are properly fitted with HAs. Phi4sius has 20db worse hearing than you and he does great with HAs. By the time you lose 20db more hearing, stem cells should be available. Most people with CI can't hear enough to understand enough on the phone. So a CI may not help you for phone use.
 
Oh and C-Nice. Who the hells the starting quarterback this year?:roll:
 
I fear the possible genetics of my situation

I fear the possible genetics of my situation. My mother was also a type one diabetic(another genetic time bomb that went off for me, mine is under good control but it killed her). Also before her death at 42 her hearing was terrible at times(again subject she hated to be brought up, I am 36 now). so I have my reaseons for being afraid.
 
Please see my above reply to you. Still waiting on how much your new HAs improved your speech.
 
Hit Pros great so far

My new digitals are great so far & all the audiograms I have ever had were unaided.
 
Anologues for 13 years

I forgot to mention my new digitals are my first pair ever, wore anologues from the age of 23 until a month ago. My mother had one of the old HA's in the seventies hated the sound and did not were it long(all I know about her loss was that it is hereditary & progressive she never liked to discuss it). I will say I got diagnosed a 22 in comical sort of way tying to join the U.S. Army because my drunk uncle dared me to.
 
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Phi4sius went from analogue HAs to digitals and got a big improvement. It's no surprise you are getting the same improvement! I got an improvement myself when I went to digitals back in 1998!
 
deafdude1 said:
Ok so you don't have auditory processing disorder, you just don't have proper, up to date HAs.



Try wearing HAs less. Don't wear them when you are home alone or in situations where you don't need to hear. Someone in another thread said that HAs make hearing worse faster.

So that explains why your speech scores are low for the degree of loss you have. If you get proper HAs and have them programmed properly with as much amplification as possible(but not more than your HL, say 50db loss, then don't get more than 50db gain) your speech scores will shoot up like a rocket! :D



Years away from now, stem cells can partially restore your hearing. I know what a big fan you are of CIs. You make 5 posts about CI everyday. I want to let you know that a CI will give hearing similar to someone with 80db HL wearing the best HAs. It won't come close to what you currently hear. Ill be getting stem cells because I want to hear my best. Your choice if you want CI, im choosing stem cells.
Click to expand...

This is not good advice. Properly fitted hearing aids will NOT cause hearing damage.
 
faire_jour said:
This is not good advice. Properly fitted hearing aids will NOT cause hearing damage.
Click to expand...

Well, some people are still worried anyway. I discussed this with my audiologist and he didn't think HAs would worsen my hearing. But no harm in not wearing HAs either. I don't wear HAs when im on the computer, I don't need to hear me typing.
 
I didnt read the whole thread. i know if i wear my HAs all the time. i will have some hearing tinnitus. So i give my hearing a rest without HA then tinnius or ringing will fade out. I dont know if it does apply to CI too.
 
I do have tinntius and had it since i was 16. I used to turn my HA's off at school because of this (and got into trouble!!) then later removed the left HA for "good" after i left school.
However now days I have HA back in Left ear and CI in right ear, when I hear tinnitus it's always more noticeable in left ear so i remove HA after few hours of wear. And just with the CI ..... no tinntius can be heard, Take CI off, the tinntius is there. So the CI is masking my tinntius. I am not too bothered with my ringing in ears and I know it will go when I hit the pillow.
 
I get tinnitus when I remove my HA, but never when I remove my CI
 
C-NICE said:
I just got new digital aids(Oticon Hit Pro) from Vocational rehabilitation commission. Also there is evidence my loss is hereditary(my mother had a hearing loss that she refused to discuss and she died young so it is not known how fast or far it would have gone). My loss is progressive, I have no problems with stem cells but can anyone say at this point when exactly sooner or later they will be available. I have to consider all options open to me. As to what is going on in other countries who is to say considering the money involved they are not buttering people's bread a little with stories of such success? I also have to depend on my hearing for my career(I work in customer service/tech support and spend hours on the phone) so anymore loss could effect my employment. I better stop now becoming a rant and dont want to do that.
Click to expand...

I have a friend whose hearing was rapidly declining. He works as an assistant CEO of a marketing company and he relies heavily on communication. His speech reception skills and speech intelligibility was comparable to that of a hearing person. His family has a hereditary progressive hearing loss and he did not know much time he had left before he lost all of his hearing. Bottom line: he knew he had to do something so he went for a CI about a year ago. To date, he is functioning almost like a hearing person. He is able to understand movies (without captions) and listen to the radio without any difficulty! He just can't locate where sounds are coming from but he is able to do his job and not worry about his job (you indicated in this thread that you are concerned that you will lose more hearing which could affect your job status). It's nice knowing that individuals have the option of going for a CI and you can consider that when you feel you have lost enough hearing to the point where hearing aids might not be beneficial to you (that is what happened to my friend and he is 43 years old). I thought my telling you this would be helpful. You're not alone with this situation.
 
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