Re: does HA restrict faster adaptation to CI?

[Guest guest]

I have been profoundly deaf since birth and have always worn 2 HA. Last

summer I received my CI and since my hookup, have worn just the CI only. Will

never put the HA in my non-implanted ear. I do so well with just the CI itself.

It really helps to train my brain to adjust to so many sounds. I have been

using the phone and can recognize sentence and words of what people are saying

without lipreading and especially on the radio.

Debbie

[Guest guest]

that is a great topic for the ci companies or audiology students to reserach

for now there s not much info on it. there is lots to explore regarding ci

use...

but whatever jerome... you will do whatever works for you. you know with or

without HA you will have what you are looking for.. improved hearing.

there are many paths to get there and you dont have to decide everything now.

wait and see on your " hearing adventure "

happy travels

[Guest guest]

Jerome:

Knowing you have asked ton of questions about CI. Keep in mind that yours

will be different from the others. No one is equally as we all have vary

results. I didn't ask as many questions as you did. I just did my own research

of

all three brands and pick the choice to fit my needs. Does your CI center do

all three brands? Some prefer not to wear HA with their CI while others

prefer to wear HA with their CI. It is their choice and perhaps their

audiologist

suggested what is best for their patients.

Debbie

[Guest guest]

If you wanted Nucleus and it is not available in your country, are you

willing to somewhere else? If not, then I would think Med-El is the only brand

you

will have to go with if you've no other choice. You will have nothing to

lose.

[Guest guest]

hi jerome

i think its very individual thing whether someone wears HA with ci . it depends

on many factors, how much beneift they get from ha etc. ideally we were made

to hear with two ears so if you can hear with both ears, that is optimal.

however some ci folks jsut dont like having a hearing aid on other ear. so i

think its just a preference too.

'

i have been activated less than one month and was told to try HA after a few

weeks with ci. i tried to put on my aid but all i hear is squealing of my HA

that i didnt hear before. now i know why hearing people dont like tohear

squealing HA. so i need to get new mold or tubing before i can try again. i

wouldnt mind not having hearing aid in that ear and only rely on ci, as i am

really enjoying no ear molds! so just one ci is plenty. the only drawback is

computerish sounds. i dont know if that will ever go away. but to me it s a

trade off and worth hearing the fuller range of sounds and the easier lipreading

im experiencing already...

joni

prelingual

HU (hook up) 4-06

[Guest guest]

as a preling bi ci, i think you are in a minoritry group, but your group

will grow.. who knows i may in it too someday

[Guest guest]

i think children with ci and HA is very different than a deaf adult who wore

HA all thier lives or not muc hof their lives and then suddenly have CI later

in life.

childrens brains are much more flexible and not the same issues orf

" retraining the brain " i think i wud definitely encourage children to start off

both ha

and ci if it was my child. early in life ie easier...

[Guest guest]

Hi,

You're asking some very good questions! In fact, I can remember

asking the exact thing of CI users when I was looking at getting

implanted.

I'll be honest with you: I HATE the way the world sounds through my

HA's. I have some nice HA's (Claro 311's) but they can only do so

much. If you're not able to hear a certain frequency...then you

simply can't hear it. Making it louder isn't going to help.

My CI provides auditory input in frequencies that I otherwise can't

hear. The sound quality is more balance with the CI. Low frequency,

mid-ranges, and hi-ranges are all there again in the right

proportions.

Yes, at first the sounds through the CI seemed VERY

robotic/electronic, but that got better with time.

After activation I was determined to use the CI. I wanted to learn

to hear with it and I felt that the best way was to turn the HA off

and depend completely on the cochlear implant. For me, the strategy

worked really well. I have no idea if it'd work for anyone else, but

it worked for me. Most days I'd put the earmold in and leave the HA

turned off. That way, I'd totally depend on what I was getting from

the CI.

After things started sounding good with the CI, I thought I'd start

using the HA again. I hated it even more than before. The poor sound

quality just didn't help me.

SO...4 months into using the CI...I rarely use a hearing aid in my

unimplanted ear. I know CI users who do use HA's and wouldn't dream

of doing otherwise; I know just as many CI users who NEVER want to

use a HA ever again.

Guess it just depends on the person!

-Jeff

happily using his Clarion 90K for 4 months today!

> Hi there,

>

> I would like to ask how many of the implantees here have cochlear

implant on

> one ear and hearing aid on another.

>

> I noticed that in general, people with cochlear implant on one ear

and

> hearing aid on another ear are less happy with the result. I'm not

sure if

> it's due to unable to completely adapt to the new sounds... I have

chatted

> with one person with hearing aid on one ear and cochlear implant

on another,

> who just said that the robotic sound don't go away, and yet,

people who have

> profound loss with cochlear implant on one ear and none on another

ear are

> happier, they said the robotic sound go away after a month.

>

> I also read some sites, and I read another cochlear implant user

who is also

> not very happy with the result, turns out that she has hearing aid

on one

> ear, and a cochlear implant on another.

>

> However, some people with cochlear implant, and hearing aid on

another, said

> that having hearing aid and implant increases their frequency

range. I find

> their claim suspicious, if implant will give you 125hertz to 8000

hertz,

> hearing aids only give you 250hertz to 4000hertz (mostly, even

less when you

> have severe/profound)...

>

> I hope to hear from you guys what you think about hearing aids

restricting

> faster adaptation to CI....

>

> I wonder if there are any studies regarding this.

>

> Some not so happy cochlear implant users worries me about the

result and

> makes me dig some further information.

>

>

> Regards/

> Jerome

>

>

>

[Guest guest]

Hi Jeff,

That has been my observation... I think your brain got used to cochlear

implant. So you will have problem going back to hearing aids... But, *IF*

you have been using cochlear implants with hearing aids, I think your brain

will not move forward in accepting the signal from the implant as it will

depend more on hearing aids because your brain is already trained to use the

hearing aid...

And in case you want to use the hearing aids again after relying on CI only

for several months, you will have to *relearn* how to hear with hearing

aids... That's what I think.

Just thought of bringing this up as people who don't use hearing aids but

only CI appear to be a lot more happier than people who use hearing aids on

the other ear. And also, I am curious about factors (factors that we can

control) affecting the satisfaction of CI user, and I think hearing aid on

the other ear is one...

Regards/

Jerome

Re: does HA restrict faster adaptation to CI?

Hi,

You're asking some very good questions! In fact, I can remember asking the

exact thing of CI users when I was looking at getting implanted.

I'll be honest with you: I HATE the way the world sounds through my HA's. I

have some nice HA's (Claro 311's) but they can only do so much. If you're

not able to hear a certain frequency...then you simply can't hear it. Making

it louder isn't going to help.

My CI provides auditory input in frequencies that I otherwise can't hear.

The sound quality is more balance with the CI. Low frequency, mid-ranges,

and hi-ranges are all there again in the right proportions.

Yes, at first the sounds through the CI seemed VERY robotic/electronic, but

that got better with time.

After activation I was determined to use the CI. I wanted to learn to hear

with it and I felt that the best way was to turn the HA off and depend

completely on the cochlear implant. For me, the strategy worked really well.

I have no idea if it'd work for anyone else, but it worked for me. Most days

I'd put the earmold in and leave the HA turned off. That way, I'd totally

depend on what I was getting from the CI.

After things started sounding good with the CI, I thought I'd start using

the HA again. I hated it even more than before. The poor sound quality just

didn't help me.

SO...4 months into using the CI...I rarely use a hearing aid in my

unimplanted ear. I know CI users who do use HA's and wouldn't dream of doing

otherwise; I know just as many CI users who NEVER want to use a HA ever

again.

Guess it just depends on the person!

-Jeff

happily using his Clarion 90K for 4 months today!

[Guest guest]

herome

i would be interested to know if postlingually deaf aare happier with ci plus HA

and prelings satisifed with only ci??

i also think those who are late deafned tend to go for bilateral ci i dont

knnow any prelingual deaf who went bilateral ci...

if i were you jerome i would seek people with similar hearing loss and history

to yours and then that wud be a better predictor for your outcome...

[Guest guest]

Hi Jonik,

I have alaready found people with similar hearing loss as I do... The

problem is, they have varied results...

Now, the factor that differs them is, one is using hearing aid on the other

side, while the happier person doesn't use any hearing aid at all. They

completely rely on CI only, so it made me think that HA interferes with the

progress of our brain in adapting CI sounds.

Regards/

Jerome

Re: Re: does HA restrict faster adaptation to CI?

herome

i would be interested to know if postlingually deaf aare happier with ci

plus HA and prelings satisifed with only ci??

i also think those who are late deafned tend to go for bilateral ci i dont

knnow any prelingual deaf who went bilateral ci...

if i were you jerome i would seek people with similar hearing loss and

history to yours and then that wud be a better predictor for your outcome...

[Guest guest]

Base on several testimonies I have read, however I don't have exact

counts...

It falls as follows in terms of happiness:

Postlingual deaf with CI only and prelingual deaf with CI only will be

almost the same in terms of satisfaction, postlingual with CI and HA are

usually not that satisfied, they feel they can't function well without the

HA on the other ear, thus, probably makes them not that confident when

relying on CI alone. And also, their brain is not trained very well for CI

only, as the brain is *most likely* to get confused whether to accept the

sounds from CI or from hearing aid (remember, both sound differently). With

the hearing aid on the other side, it's most likely that the brain will be

constantly reminded by the hearing aid sounds that that should how things

sound, thus, high possibility to reject the sounds from CI...

You would noticed that I put words like " most likely " and " usually " because

these are just my hypothesis base on what I have observed/analyzed.

Regards/

Jerome

Re: Re: does HA restrict faster adaptation to CI?

herome

i would be interested to know if postlingually deaf aare happier with ci

plus HA and prelings satisifed with only ci??

i also think those who are late deafned tend to go for bilateral ci i dont

knnow any prelingual deaf who went bilateral ci...

if i were you jerome i would seek people with similar hearing loss and

history to yours and then that wud be a better predictor for your outcome...

[Guest guest]

Joni--I am prelingually deafened and I have bilateral CI's. I know of a few

bilateral prelingual CIers.

--

Snoopy

bilateral

RI

[Guest guest]

Nope, only Med-El is here. I'm from Philippines by the way. At first, my

choice was Nucleus, and that would require me to fly out of the country.

Regards/

Jerome

Re: Re: does HA restrict faster adaptation to CI?

Jerome:

Knowing you have asked ton of questions about CI. Keep in mind that yours

will be different from the others. No one is equally as we all have vary

results. I didn't ask as many questions as you did. I just did my own

research of all three brands and pick the choice to fit my needs. Does your

CI center do all three brands? Some prefer not to wear HA with their CI

while others prefer to wear HA with their CI. It is their choice and

perhaps their audiologist suggested what is best for their patients.

Debbie

[Guest guest]

My first thought is that there really isn't a way to study this because

hearing and satisfaction with a CI is so subjective. Also, you could only study

each person in one situation and not both. Once the decision has been made to

wear or not to wear the HA over the first 6 months, let's say, there is no

going back.

Anyway, I was advised from the beginning that it would benefit me to NOT wear

the HA while I was acclimating to the implant. It mades sense to me and I

trusted my audie implicitly. I have some useable hearing in my other ear and it

took me a quite a while before I noticed that my reliance was moving from my

unimplanted ear to my implanted ear. I do believe that it would have taken me

even longer if I had chosen to wear my aid. However, if I really did need

the aid in my other ear just to function in my daily life, then I would have

worn it when I needed to. Over the long run, our comfort is more important.

One

can always choose not to wear their HA for aperiod of time just to see what

happens...and put it back in anytime as well.

In a message dated 4/29/2004 12:53:12 PM Eastern Standard Time,

jt1@... writes:

I hope to hear from you guys what you think about hearing aids restricting

faster adaptation to CI....

I wonder if there are any studies regarding this.

[Guest guest]

this is interesting, after my daughter's ci implant God-willing) she'll

still wear her heairng aid in the other ear. i was told this input from both

will create a balnace for her and making use of the sounds she already knows

more familiar with tht CI. so then what happens if she no longer benefits

from that hearing aid and has to rely solely on the CI, will this be

difficult to adapt to ( will it be like a brand new sound without that

acousitcal input from the hearing aid?) and even if she gets implanted in

the other ear down the line, is the total electrical stim sound be so

different that its difficult to adapt too? hmm...am i making sense here?

----- Original Message -----

>

> I have alaready found people with similar hearing loss as I do... The

> problem is, they have varied results...

>

> Now, the factor that differs them is, one is using hearing aid on the

other

> side, while the happier person doesn't use any hearing aid at all. They

> completely rely on CI only, so it made me think that HA interferes with

the

> progress of our brain in adapting CI sounds.

>

>

>

>

[Guest guest]

After wearing CI for almost a year, so I decided to try on HA on my other

ear. Boy! It's a huge difference of sound! It seems like the sounds

from my HA mask the sounds from CI in my brain. I rather to ear with CI

only, not with HA because I can hear more.

Also, I don't like the earmold. I feel free for not wearing earmold!

-gs

--

Greg Swager

Nucleus 03/03/03

gswager@...

[Guest guest]

When you said mask, you mean it covers the sound of the CI? If that's the

case I think that's just normal. You hear louder sounds from HA..

Regards/

Jerome

Re: does HA restrict faster adaptation to CI?

After wearing CI for almost a year, so I decided to try on HA on my other

ear. Boy! It's a huge difference of sound! It seems like the sounds from

my HA mask the sounds from CI in my brain. I rather to ear with CI only,

not with HA because I can hear more.

Also, I don't like the earmold. I feel free for not wearing earmold!

-gs

--

Greg Swager

Nucleus 03/03/03

gswager@...

[Guest guest]

The problem with hearing aids is that they don't function similar as

eyeglass. In sensorineural hearing loss, when you have 70db loss, when the

sound goes in is 30db, it will be amplified to 75db or 80db, and what your

ears hear is 75db or 80db, and not 30db. 75db and 80db is loud... That's why

people with sensorineural hearing loss find sounds too loud for them to get

hurt or too soft for them to hear.

The same cannot be said if you have conductive hearing loss...

I have not had my CI so I base this on what I have read, cochlear implants

does not make sound louder, but makes you be able to hear soft sounds. So

sounds remain to be soft and yet audible.

Regards/

Jerome

Re: Re: does HA restrict faster adaptation to CI?

In a message dated 4/29/2004 9:18:36 PM Pacific Standard Time,

jt1@... writes:

If that's the

case I think that's just normal. You hear louder sounds from HA..

Not sure what you mean, my loss pre-CI was 90dB at 250 slope downward to NR

at 750-1,000,, with hearing aid, best I got was around 60 to 65dB at 250.

With CI, i hear at 30dB. I do not " see " it as " louder " , just that I first

hear at louder sounds.

I spoke louder when I had my HA than now.

Can you explain?

Lee

[Guest guest]

my daughter's audio said that wearing a CI and a hearing aid is a good

thing, my question is this: will she be dependent on her hearing aid to make

good use of her CI because of the way the brain integrates sound, or if a

year down the road goes by and her hearing has gotten worse in that ear

(right) having to get rid of the hearing aid, she'll still be fine with just

that one CI on her left ear?

make sense?

Re: does HA restrict faster adaptation to CI?

> After wearing CI for almost a year, so I decided to try on HA on my other

> ear. Boy! It's a huge difference of sound! It seems like the sounds

> from my HA mask the sounds from CI in my brain. I rather to ear with CI

> only, not with HA because I can hear more.

>

> Also, I don't like the earmold. I feel free for not wearing earmold!

> -gs

> --

> Greg Swager

> Nucleus 03/03/03

> gswager@...

>

>

>

>

>

[Guest guest]

In my opinion, I think a persons ability to use a hearing aid with

the ci is directly connected to how much residual hearing they have

in the unimplanted ear. I tried my hearing aid briefly a couple of

months after being implanted to see if it would help me localize

sound better.. it didn't take me long to put it away for good.. My

hearing was too far gone for the hearing aid to be of any value to

me and I hear so much better with just the ci, from which btw,

sounds are mostly normal to me.. as I remember them. If I had a

chance to have my other ear implanted, I'd do it, but to this date,

my center only does one implant in order to give as many people as

possible the chance to hear with at least one ear.. I can live with

that for now, because I know exactly what it's like being able to

hear sounds for the first time and I too want everyone possible to

have this chance if they qualify. Words can't really describe the

feeling unless one has been there.

Like you Greg,

I am so happy not having to have a mold stuck in my ear any longer..

I have had exactly one ear infection in the 2 and a half years since

my implant where I was getting them frequently when I wore my

hearing aids.. due to the moisture in my ear that allowed bacteria

to grow and thrive.

Have a great day.

Hugs,

Silly MI

In , Greg Swager <gswager@y...> wrote:

> After wearing CI for almost a year, so I decided to try on HA on

my other

> ear. Boy! It's a huge difference of sound! It seems like the

sounds

> from my HA mask the sounds from CI in my brain. I rather to ear

with CI

> only, not with HA because I can hear more.

>

> Also, I don't like the earmold. I feel free for not wearing

earmold!

> -gs

> --

> Greg Swager

> Nucleus 03/03/03

> gswager@y...

[Guest guest]

I am catching up on email but thought I would say something on this. I was

at the state SHHH convention over the past weekend and I talked to several

people that had a CI in one ear and HA in the other. They all said that

they like having hearing with both ears. After today I know I will be one

of the people with a HA in the other ear. Not hearing from one ear bothers

me. While I don't miss the ear molds, the hearing is more important.

susan & hobbes

michigan

At 12:47 AM 4/30/2004 +0800, you wrote:

>Hi there,

>

>I would like to ask how many of the implantees here have cochlear implant on

>one ear and hearing aid on another.

>

>I noticed that in general, people with cochlear implant on one ear and

>hearing aid on another ear are less happy with the result. I'm not sure if

>it's due to unable to completely adapt to the new sounds... I have chatted

>with one person with hearing aid on one ear and cochlear implant on another,

>who just said that the robotic sound don't go away, and yet, people who have

>profound loss with cochlear implant on one ear and none on another ear are

>happier, they said the robotic sound go away after a month.

[Guest guest]

I think these are questons that can't necessarily be answered. Who knows how

things will go a year down the road?? If she wears her hearing aid for the

first year and gets used to the sound of both CI amd HA, then there would be

another period of adjustment with the CI alone. It would seem that motivation

is a key factor. How motivated will she be to go through another period of

adjustment? But leaving the HA off and then putting it back in the ear doesn't

seem to require the same amount of adjustment IMO.

In a message dated 4/30/2004 8:28:27 AM Eastern Standard Time, sohada@...

writes:

my question is this: will she be dependent on her hearing aid to make

good use of her CI because of the way the brain integrates sound, or if a

year down the road goes by and her hearing has gotten worse in that ear

(right) having to get rid of the hearing aid, she'll still be fine with just

that one CI on her left ear?

[Guest guest]

This is exactly how I feel. The goal is for better hearing so whatever we need

to use to make that happen makes sense to me. Please remember...this is my

personal opinion.

While I don't miss the ear molds, the hearing is more important.

susan & hobbes

[Guest guest]

Hi there,

I read this post with some delay and that's why I didn't post earlier.

My daughter Natalia is 7 and was activated Jan 16 2004. She's severe to

profound and was a good HA user. She was implanted in her worse ear and

since activation is wearing CI + HA. As a result she had no problem adapting

to the new CI sound at all and had no difficult " transition " period, which

I'd expect would happen if she had to start with CI only. Our audi says that

as she has usable hearing in her right ear, our goal is to utilize sound

bilateraly with the help of CI + HA. In that case it is not a good idea to

let her brain get used to CI only and then have another adaptation period,

getting used to CI + HA. Instead her brain was exposed to CI+HA from the

very beginning. The result is her hearing has been continously improving

since the activation and she could never hear as good as now. I also see her

speech discrimination is getting better, including understanding TV and

phone conversation, which she just didn't get at all before the implant. And

I expect it to get even better, as it's only been 3 months...

There has been a fresh study on using CI + HA, and some information about it

can be found at:

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?cmd=Retrieve & db=pubmed & dopt=Ab

stract & list_uids=15035557

I also noticed (but it's just my observation) that people tend to prefer CI

only if they have so little hearing in their reamaining ear it's just isn't

useful to them. People with useful residual hearing in unimplanted ear say

that HA in that ear improves their overall hearing as well as sound

localization. So it might be an important factor in deciding for or against

HA with the CI.

Regards,

Ewa Rakowska

Re: Re: does HA restrict faster adaptation to CI?

herome

i would be interested to know if postlingually deaf aare happier with ci

plus HA and prelings satisifed with only ci??

i also think those who are late deafned tend to go for bilateral ci i dont

knnow any prelingual deaf who went bilateral ci...

if i were you jerome i would seek people with similar hearing loss and

history to yours and then that wud be a better predictor for your outcome...