Hearing Aid Orientation Checklist
Description of Audiogram
- The audiogram is basically a graph of the hearing tests that we just administered
- The Blue O's are the responses that you gave for the left ear
- The Red X's are the responses that you gave for the right ear
- On the X-axis is the frequency of sounds, lows are toward 250 Hz, highs are toward 8000Hz
- You can almost think of it as a piano, the low keys are here moving up to the high keys
- You can think of it as the sound of my voice is low and the sound of a child's voice or bird chirping is over here
- On the Y-axis is the decibel or loudness scale of sounds
- You can look at this as the volume that it takes for you to hear sound
- Zero is at the top and 110, basically the loudest levels that are safe to listen to are here
- Speech is a dynamic range meaning it encompasses many frequencies
- The range below 20 decibels is what we consider to be normal and this is the range of where your hearing is
- Suspicion of problem
- conductive
- cochlea
- retrocochlea
COSI (Client Oriented Scale of Improvement)
- The patient self identifies situations of hearing difficulty that they would like to improve
- Pre-fitting assessment tool
- Most commonly used outcome measure among clinicians
- Useful for formalizing the specific listening goals a patient has for hearing aids
- Patient identifies up to five (at least three) specific listening situations in which he or she would like to hear better
- Make each item as specific as possible (Hearing my friends while playing cribbage at the Elks Club)
- Rank them in order of most important
Hearing Aid Orientation Checklist
- Tell them what you want to get from this experience
- Identify level of user, manage expectations
- How comfortable are you with technology?
- Parts of the hearing aid
- Battery Drawer
- How to open and close/turn on/off
- This is how you turn it on
- How you change the battery
- Battery size
- 10; 3 - 5 days
- 312; 1 week
- 13; 1-1.5wks (10-14 days)
- 678; 2 wks
- Battery size
- Color of battery pack, show example
- Where to buy
- Direction of insertion
- Aeration of battery for 60 seconds for prolonged life
- pull off the sticker and let sit for one minute
- they are activated by the air and letting it sit for a minute gives it a longer life span
- Life of battery depends on usage
- The hearing aids will sound a tone as a warning that the batteries are low
- Batteries are toxic and can look like candy or pills to children or food to an animal
- keep them out of reach of children and pets
- there is a battery hotline in case someone swallows it
- here is the number to poison control
- *Phonak are rechargeable, can typically get 16 hours of use from them, need to charge them every day/night
- Storing the hearing aid
- make sure to open the batter door at night when you are not using them to preserve the life of the battery
- best to store them in a dry place
- Battery Drawer
- Parts of the hearing aid
- Body of hearing aid
- Button
- Mode/Program control
- Volume control
- Up on the right
- red, right, raise
- Down on the left
- left, lower, blue
- Up on the right
- Microphone, where the hearing aid draws in sound
- Positon
- Example
- Receiver
- This is where sound exits
- Vents allow air to flow
- Button
- Body of hearing aid
- Right from Left
- Red and Blue
- How to put on
- Direction of Receiver illustrates side specificity
- insert the ric completely in canal
- make sure the wire is flush with the ear
- illustrate on self
- use a mirror to show them
- How to troubleshoot/Management
- cerumen build-up
- domes
- monthly
- wax guards
- monthly
- how to replace and clean
- explain that sound can change or feedback can occur
- make sure that the aids are inserted
- Smartphone Control/Accessibility
- bluetooth control
- add to accessiblity
- general > accessbility > hearing devices > bluetooth on (to search for device)
- triple tap home button to access
- download app for more functionality
- Have them remove and insert it twice
- Have them explore the functionality
- Water resistant, not waterproof
- no showering
- no swimming
- a little rain or sweat is okay but be mindful that excess water could cause complications
- Ask them if they have any other questions
Hearing Aid Materials
- Acrylic
- May get slightly softer when warm
- Durable and easy to modify
- Best material for many older patients
- Polyvinyl Chloride
- Available in softer (recommended for children) and harder varieties
- More comfortable than acrylic
- Hearing losses in the moderate to severe range
- Not as slick as acrylic, not as tacky as silicone
- Silicone
- Soft & tacky nature, appropriate for children and ideal for profound hearing loss
- Recommended for greater hearing loss
- Difficult to modify