Hearing Loss Help  

by Neil Bauman, Ph.D.

One of the common complaints CapTel phone users have is garbled captions and missing words.

Here are some “tricks” to improve your CapTel experience, and information on how to report problems by Pamela Holmes the Director, Consumer & Regulatory Affairs/CapTel Customer Service at Ultratec, Inc. She has the inside information on what you can (and should) do if you have problems with the captions on your CapTel phone. She explains:

First, users should be aware that the captionist can only hear the person’s voice they are captioning. The captionist cannot hear you if you try to give him/her any instructions or ask him to repeat something. Thus, if you are having any problems, here are some alternate ideas.

1. If you have 2-line CapTel, simply press the caption button off (to release the connection to the current captionist) and then press the caption button back on again. In 12-15 seconds a new captionist will be connected to your existing call. The hearing party will remain connected on Line 1 and you can speak to and “listen” (if you wish to use your residual hearing during this time) to the other party the whole time. To make this transition transparent to the other party, press off and on the caption button while you are doing the taking. The other party will have no idea anything has changed, yet a new captionist will be brought onto the call.

2. If you only have single line CapTel, and the call is not going well, it is best to hang up and get a new connection, or ask the other party to repeat what was said. After the call, jot down the time and date of the call and the CA number and send an email to CapTel describing briefly the experience on the call. CapTel Customer Service will follow up with the Captioning Service management and the CA and their supervisor to be sure the CA has the quality monitoring and skill set to caption the call at the standards we expect. You can also call 1-888-269-7477 to speak to a CapTel Customer Service representative. They answer calls between 8 am and 5 PM Central Time, and are dedicated to assisting you.

3. If a call is garbled, shows dropped characters or the captions are nonsensical, then the cause may be due to interference on the phone line, or using a line that does not support the data connection required to carry the captions with accuracy. With voice recognition transcription there should be whole words. CapTel Customer Service can also help troubleshoot and identify the causes of such problems.

There you have it. If you are having troubles with your CapTel captioning, follow these tips. You don’t have to suffer in silence. The more you report captioning problems, the sooner the system will be improved.

by Neil Bauman, Ph.D.

In response to last month’s article “Room Loops—Hearing the TV and People Talking at the Same Time“, a man wrote:

I am a huge fan of my Univox room loop amplifier and thought I’d contribute my experience because what you said about listening to another person while watching TV.

I agree it is futile to try to hear what someone is saying while the Univox is blasting the TV audio through your t-coil, even with the your hearing aid set in the combined t-coil + mic setting, which mine is.

The perfect solution for me is a DVR (digital video recorder), like Tivo or one that comes with most cable or direct TV subscriptions. This way, when my wife wants to talk to me she just hits “pause” on the live TV. Since my hearing aids have both the t-coil and microphone on at the same time, my hearing aids’ microphones pick up what she is saying, and then when she’s finished talking, she hits “play” and the loop kicks right back in. It works great!

Unfortunately my wife still attempts to talk to me without pressing pause sometimes, but after I yell “What” enough times she realizes she needs to pause it. It’s not perfect, but it sure is better than switching the aid out of t coil mode and muting the TV every time.

To learn more about the beautiful, clear sounds produced by room loops read “Loop Systems—The Best-Kept Secret in Town“. See the wonderful Univox loop system (mentioned above) here.

by Neil Bauman, Ph.D.

According to an animal study at the University of Michigan, “a combination of high doses of vitamins A, C and E and magnesium, taken one hour before noise exposure and continued as a once-daily treatment for five days, was very effective at preventing permanent noise-induced hearing loss.” (1)

Here’s why researchers think this works. They feel that one of the major factors causing hearing loss from loud noise is excessive free radical activity. “Scientists have learned that noise-induced hearing loss occurs, in part, because cell mitochondria in the inner ear churn out damaging free radicals in response to loud sounds.”

Think of these free radicals as tiny enemy bullets. If they fatally damage a cell, it goes into a process called apotosis—in which the cell systematically shuts itself down and dies. If those cells are the hair cells in your inner ears, then you lose hearing when those hair cells die. Thus, it is important to zap the free radicals before they do their dastardly deeds.

The anti-oxidant vitamins are the “good guys”. They act as tiny missiles that shoot down the free radical bullets before they can cause any damage.

In addition to the vitamins A, C and E, your body makes a powerful antioxidant called glutathione. (This above study didn’t include glutathione, but it should have.) You see, “glutathione is considered the most powerful natural antioxidant there is. Your body makes this antioxidant naturally from compounds such as N-acetyl-cysteine and D-methionine which in turn are made from three amino acids-cysteine, glycine and glutamic acid. When your ears need extra help, taking N-acetyl-cysteine and D-methionine helps your body quickly make more glutathione.” (2)

“According to the researchers, pre-treatment [with vitamins A, C and E and magnesium] presumably reduced the free radicals that form during and after noise exposure, and noise-induced constriction of blood flow to the inner ear, and may have also reduced neural excitotoxicity, or the damage to auditory neurons that can occur due to over-stimulation. The post- noise nutrient doses apparently “scavenged” free radicals that continue to form long after this noise exposure ends.” (1)

That magnesium helps our ears is nothing new. Back in 2005 I wrote, “In addition, researchers now know that the mineral magnesium plays an important part in hearing. Scientists have found that a magnesium deficiency increases susceptibility to noise damage. One of the things that happens is the lack of magnesium causes the tiny blood vessels in your ears to constrict, thus depriving them of an adequate supply of oxygen. At the same time, loud noise depletes your ears of magnesium—so loud noise actually causes a double-whammy. There is evidence that high doses of magnesium taken soon after a sudden hearing loss can sometimes help restore hearing.” (2)

The University of Michigan has applied for patents covering the use of this combination of vitamins and minerals. However, you don’t have to take their patented formulation if you don’t want to. Just make sure you are taking adequate daily doses of vitamins A, C and E, and magnesium supplements, and you will get essentially the same protection.

You can get all of the above in almost any good health food store for a fraction of what you will likely have to pay for the patented formulations. Furthermore, when you get your own supplements, you can tailor the amounts you take of each supplement to fit your own body chemistry and lifestyle.

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After having said all this, don’t be stupid and deliberately expose your ears to loud sounds thinking that you can always zap the free radicals with the various things named above. These nutrients help, but they don’t do a perfect job. You will likely still experience some degree of ear damage.

Thus, If you are around noisy machinery, use loud lawnmowers and leaf blowers, ride noisy recreational vehicles such as motorcycles and snowmobiles, go to loud sports venues or loud concerts, in addition to taking your vitamins and glutathione, etc., Wear ear protectors. The little foam ones available at most drugstores for a few bucks go a long ways towards protecting your ears from the results of excessive noise.

(1) “Nutrients might prevent hearing loss in war zones, concert halls & workplaces, new animal study suggests” by Anne Reuter, 2007. University of Michigan Health System.

(2) “Loud Music and Hearing Loss” by Neil Bauman, 2005.

by Neil Bauman, Ph.D. with Steve Barber

Steve Barber is a great hard of hearing guy and a friend of mine. He also knows his stuff. If you are thinking about getting hearing aids, you would do well to read the following.

Steve writes:

I get asked a lot about how to shop for hearing aids:

I usually tell people several things:

1. Get all the free hearing screenings you want, but don’t buy a hearing aid based solely on one. Especially, if you don’t know what is causing your hearing loss, then a full audiological exam and consultation with an ENT is a very good idea. Some losses don’t need hearing aids; some can be helped by other means; and some may be a symptom of another medical problem that you don’t want to ignore.

2. The bigger, and more frequent the advertisement, the more cautious you should be.

3. The more the ad promises, the less you should be willing to believe it.

4. Never buy an aid that is offered at a “special price” if you must decide immediately.

5. If the seller’s primary selling point is that the aid is “invisible”, be very suspicious; If that’s your primary desired feature, then examine your motives. Hearing better is the real reason to buy a hearing aid, not invisibility.

6. If you can’t name and describe possible benefits for at least 3 features of hearing aids, then do more homework. There are a lot more things to consider, but at the very least, you should know the benefits of directional mics, telecoils and vents or open fittings.

7. Make sure you know the terms of the trial period. 30 Days is a minimum with only a relatively small fitting fee charged if you decide not to buy the aids—typically around 10% of the total price.

8. If you ask the provider about whether the aid has a telecoil, and the seller says you don’t need one, get a second, unbiased opinion. You may not need or want one, but you may be missing out on a great feature if it turns out that it would help you.

9. Unbiased opinions are most readily obtained from people who are successfully using hearing aids; not from people whose aids are in a drawer! Successful users can often be found by attending any Hearing Loss Association of America chapter meetings. (See their website for the location of the numerous HLAA chapters throughout the USA.)

by Neil Bauman, Ph.D.

A man asked:

What do you think of the new Lyric hearing aid shown on their website? I’d be interested in your thoughts.

I have mixed feelings about this Lyric hearing aid. Personally, I don’t think I would ever get one—even if my hearing was such that it would help me. (My hearing is too poor for that hearing aid to be of much use.)

First, I don’t like the idea of the hearing aid stuck in my ear canal for 3 or 4 months at a time. I think our eardrums need to breathe, etc.

Second, this is really just a fancy “Songbird” hearing aid—that was already tried and failed. Both the Songbird and the Lyric were/are disposable hearing aids. When the battery dies, you throw them away and get new ones.

However, in the case of the Lyric, you can’t put the new one hearing aid in your ear by yourself—so if the battery dies while you are at an important convention for example, you not only won’t hear, but the hearing aid will block any sound trying to get in to that ear. I’d much rather buy a hearing aid I can put in and take out myself, and one I can change the batteries on too.

Third, it is a “plain Jane” analog hearing aid. It is not digital so can’t do any fancy digital speech processing that current digital hearing aids do.

Fourth, it does not have a t-coil in it so you couldn’t use it to hear via room loops or neckloops, etc.

Fifth, I don’t know the price, but I think you will find that you are paying much more for it over the years than you would pay for a “conventional” hearing aid. You will need to purchase at lest 3 a year for each ear. Thus, you need to compare their “contract” price per year with what conventional hearing aids would cost you per year. When you amortize the cost of conventional hearing aids over 5 to 10 years (and I regularly get 10 years with my aids), I think you will find these Lyrics are VERY expensive—and remember that is for “plain Jane” aids, not fancy digital conventional aids.

Sixth, if you wanted to go swimming, you could take them out with the gizmo provided—but then you are deaf until you can go to your audiologist and get them inserted properly again.

Seventh, any hearing aid that has as its prime selling point, that it is totally invisible is barking up the wrong tree. The main selling point should be that it helps you hear ever so much better. Being invisible isn’t really a positive thing. Actually, it is better that the hearing aid IS visible. That way people know you are hard of hearing and can make allowances for you. When you wear invisible hearing aids, people just assume you have perfect hearing and treat you like a boor if you don’t move when they say “excuse me” from behind you and you don’t hear them.

I’m sure there are more things I could say, but those are some of the things that immediately come to mind. As you can tell, I’m not too enamored with them.

However, on the plus side, because the Lyric is inserted so far down the ear canal, your outer ears should work normally in collecting and filtering sounds before these sounds reach the microphone. This should make things sound quite natural.

by Neil Bauman, Ph.D.

Some children are much more accepting of their hearing losses and their need to wear hearing aids if they have friends or siblings that also wear hearing aids, or even a doll or teddy bear that is “hard of hearing” and wears hearing aids just like they do.

The question is, “Where can you get an appropriate doll that wears hearing aids?” Look no further. I just discovered that Lakeshore Learning Materials carries a line of dolls that wear hearing aids—just like your son or daughter does.

To see these dolls, go to Lakeshore’s website. In the search box at the top type “multi-ethnic school dolls”. There are dolls of 5 ethnicities—black, white, Hispanic, Asian or native American. You can choose either a girl or boy doll from any ethnic origin.

To find the hearing aids for these dolls, type “hearing aids” in the search box and then click on the resulting picture. From the various adaptive equipment sets, choose the set of two hearing aids and two pairs of eyeglasses.

Watch your child’s eyes open wide when they discover their new doll is wearing hearing aids just like them! Bet it will be love at first sight.

by Neil Bauman, Ph.D.

A man wrote:

Is it possible that Nexium has caused my sudden bouts of tinnitus, first in my left ear, and a week later in my right ear? I was taking 40 mg twice daily for about 6-8 weeks. Is there a chance that it will go away after I discontinue the medication? I think I’m going crazy with 2 different tones that will not stop!

Yes, it’s certainly possible to get tinnitus from taking Esomeprazole (Nexium). Tinnitus is listed as one of the side effects listed for Nexium, but it doesn’t appear to be all that common.

Although there is not much information on the permanence of tinnitus from this drug, I think there is a good chance that your tinnitus will go away a week or two after you stop taking the Esomeprazole. However, a lot depends on you, and how you are handling your tinnitus now. If you dwell on your tinnitus all the time, it will be much harder for it to go away, than if you treat it as a “non-person” and pretend it doesn’t exist—in other words remain totally emotionally neutral to it.

I’ve had tinnitus for 40 years or so. It never goes away, but I don’t let it bother me either. It is just “there”.

Any advice for a desperate man?

If I were in your shoes and knew a drug was causing me horrible tinnitus, I’d dump the drug in a heartbeat. I encourage you to either get your doctor to prescribe another medication that doesn’t cause tinnitus, or investigate alternate treatments for your condition. Here are a few to get you started.

Sometimes acid reflux is caused by certain vertebrae in your back being “out”. A chiropractic treatment can quickly fix it. (That happened to my brother so I know it works.) Sometimes acid reflux results because you don’t have enough hydrochloric acid (HCL) in your stomach and thus you need to take HCL supplements. (I know it seems wrong to treat acid with acid, but this works for many people). Another thing to consider is what you eat. Some foods cause problems and others don’t. So eating correctly can solve it easily. (My wife has problems at night with acid reflux whenever she eats certain foods for supper— especially if we have a late supper. The better part of valor is to avoid them altogether or eat them early in the day.) Finally, being obese can cause such problems. Simply reducing your weight can fix the problem.

So those are some of the things I’d consider. You might find your problems stem from a combination of several of the above and possibly others I haven’t mentioned.

If you are interested in learning more about what you can do to help bring your tinnitus under your control, you would do well to read my book, “When Your Ears Ring! Cope With Your Tinnitus—Here’s How“.

by Neil Bauman, Ph.D.

Serene Innovations has just released what I have been looking for (and longing for) for a long time, namely a loud in-line amplified binaural hands-free headset for a standard desk phone.

I have tried all the hands-free headsets I could find, but none of them had the volume I required. (In their “wisdom” the engineers had limited the maximum volume to a value well below what I required.) Thus, you can imagine my surprise and delight when I discovered the new Serene Innovations UA-50 Handset/Headset amplifier!

Since I do not wear my hearing aids much (my choice), and since I have a severe loss at 1000 Hz, I need lots of amplification in order to hear on the phone, and this is where this handset/headset amplifier excels.

Currently I use the most powerful amplified phone there is (the Clarity XL-50), but I wanted a binaural headset so I could hear in both ears and have my hands free at the same time.

Hearing in both ears at the same time has two major advantages. First, you only need about half the volume when listening with both ears as compared to listening with only one ear to get the same degree of comprehension. This means that by turning the volume down a bit, your own voice is not so loud in your ears. (This has always been a problem for me. I need so much amplification that my own voice almost deafens me.) Thus this reduced volume requirement helps preserve my little remaining hearing.

Second, your comprehension goes up when you hear with both ears. In other words, you now understand more of what the person at the other end is saying. This means you don’t have to strain so much in order to hear/understand them, nor ask for as many repeats.

When I first put this headset on, I thought I had died and gone to heaven! The sound was loud and clear in both ears, yet it did not overload my ears as the phone handset does, and my own voice wasn’t deafening me anymore either. Because of the attached boom mic, I no longer have to try to jam the phone under my chin while I type on the keyboard.

There’s no two ways about it. I love this hands-free, in-line amplifier and binaural headset. It works with basically any phone with the dial in the base—home or business phone—since it sits between the phone base and handset. (You can switch between the phone’s handset and the amplified headset at the push of a button.)

If you are in the same boat as me, you will love it too. Click here to get this UA-50 handset/headset amplifier for yourself.

P. S. Don’t tell anyone, but I’m using this amplified headset on my amplified phone (which they say never to do—but it works). With the enormous amplification available in the XL-50 phone base itself plus the added amplification in the UA-50 headset amplifier, if I crank them both up, I’ll bet I’ll be able to even hear you thinking (and all without any hint of annoying feedback either)!

by Neil Bauman, Ph.D.

A lady wrote:

I thought if anyone had an idea for this problem it would be you. My husband who is hard of hearing receives calls during the night from work on his cell phone which does not ring loud enough to wake him up. Any ideas on any alert systems that work for cell phone? He uses a Sonic Alert alarm clock that will work with receivers, but everything I have seen only works with corded phones.

I think you are right—up until now, all alerting systems worked with landline phones and not with cell phones. However, there is more than one way to skin the cat, so to speak.

I can think of four ways to accomplish this.

1. You could take on the task of listening for the cell phone ringing and poke him to wake him up (assuming you can hear the phone ringing yourself). I don’t recommend this as a regular “duty”, but it could work in a pinch. It is not a good idea to have a spouse act as the “ears” for the hard of hearing partner. This can build resentment in the hearing spouse and doesn’t teach the hard of hearing person to be responsible for his own hearing loss, nor how to use effective hearing loss coping strategies and assistive devices.

2. If he has call forwarding on his cell phone—before he goes to bed, he could set it to call forward to your landline phone and then hook the landline phone into his alerting system if he has such a system.

For example, with Silent Call’s Lamplighter, you could plug in your landline phone. Then he would be woken up when either phone rings since any cell phone calls would be automatically forwarded to the landline phone.

One thing I like about the Lamplighter is that you can plug your bed table lamp into it as well. When the phone rings, the bed table light will blink on and off in addition to the bed shaker vibrating the fillings out of your teeth! Having a flashing light is a good idea for when you are already up, but are still in the bedroom and thus wouldn’t feel the bed shaking,

3. He could use a sound module transmitter such as those used for baby’s crying. Put the phone right beside the sound module transmitter and when the cell phone rings, the sound of the phone ringing should set it off. The sound module would then transmit an alerting signal to the base station, which in turn would set off the alarm, flashing lights and bed shaker—enough to waken the dead one way or another.

To do this, you could use the Silent Call Lamplighter system I mentioned above, for example. All you’d need in addition to the Lamplighter is the Sound Monitor module. You can see these Silent Call system products here.

4. I’ve saved the surprise for last. Serene Innovations just released the exact gizmo your husband is looking for. It’s the RF-110 Super Loud Cell/Phone Ring Alerter. The blurb says, “You’ll never miss a telephone call again, day or night! This ringer has both audible and visual alerts that are activated when there is an incoming phone call on your landline telephone or your cell phone.” If that is not enough, you can plug in an optional bed shaker for nighttime alerts. Includes AC adapter.

Get the RF-110 Super Loud Cell/Phone Ring Alerter here. You can get the optional bed shaker to plug in to this unit from there as well.

by Neil Bauman, Ph.D.

Many hard of hearing people are not being fair to either themselves or their audiologists. They go to their audiologists and want “instant hearing” again. They fail to realize that their brains need to re-learn how to hear again—and retraining brains takes time.

Audiologists, too, are at fault for not making this rehabilitative process a priority in their practices. In fact, some don’t even see the need for it.

However, there are some good audiologists out there. One such audiologist wrote:

One common misconception (even amongst audiologists) is that hearing aids are a “stick it in your ear and hear” thing, whereas cochlear implants (CIs) need considerable training and reprogramming. This is a very untrue statement regarding hearing aids.

If audiologists spent as much time fitting hearing aids as they do for CI’s, then there would be much happier hearing aid users. The problem is, insurance companies pay for much of the retraining for CIs, but usually nothing at all for hearing aids. Thus, unfortunately, many times the quality of care people get is dictated by their insurance companies and not their individual needs.

At the same time, many people just want a quick fix—stick something in my ear so I can hear normally again. Just give me a pill to fix what ails me. You should have heard some of the comments I have gotten from long term hearing aid users when I suggested they needed aural rehabilitation, especially when they got a new hearing aid.

Fitting a hearing aid takes a team of at least two experts with equal participation. One in the technology expert (audiologist) and the other is the expert on your unique hearing loss (you).

Coping with hearing loss is a lifelong process. In order to successfully live with your hearing loss, you are going to have to work at it. The more you put in, the more you get out.

At the very minimum there are five areas you need to address:

1. Psychologically and emotionally adjust to your hearing loss,
2. Learn and practice good hearing loss coping strategies,
3. Learn to speechread,
4. Wear properly fitted hearing aids, and
5. Supplement your hearing aids with assistive devices as needed.

To help you to successfully live with your hearing loss, I have put together a manual called “Keys to Successfully Living with your Hearing Loss“. This manual covers a lot of what you need to know, but your audiologist doesn’t have time to tell you. Having this manual lets you read and re-read it until it becomes a natural part of your life. Click the above link to get this invaluable manual now.