Phonak Savia BTE Hearing Aid Review

Phonak Savia BTE Hearing Aids gave me back my hearing - and my life!

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My father lost his hearing at age 23. The whys and hows are a long story but suffice to say, I always wondered if I, too, would go deaf like him. I don't know why I wondered that really. But as a young child, I just knew. Someday, I would end up deaf.

I was repeatedly told that my ear infections had nothing at all to do with nerve deafness like my father had and to not worry. Fast forward to the day about five years ago when I was told, in no uncertain terms, that I was going deaf. Like my father. And there was nothing at all I could do to stop or slow it.

Talk about depression. I was first in avoidance and then severely depressed. My Dad had it rough as a clear speaking adult deafened man who refused to learn sign or lip reading. He hated his deafness and he made sure we all knew it.

Now, I was going to endure the same fate.

I was offered a hearing aid. I flatly refused. I would NEVER wear a hearing aid. NEVER! That would mean I was old. I was deaf. I was disabled. I was weak. I was not whole.

My Dad begged me to see a certain audiologist that he liked very much but I refused. I simply would not relent. I knew my hearing was going because conversation was harder to understand. I didn't hear the security buzzers that went off when I left stores with products that were inadvertently still tagged. I found myself looking at my husband when someone soft spoken asked me a question and he repeated it for me. TV shows seemed like jigsaw puzzles. Usually I could put it all together but sometimes pieces were missing.

When my Dad died unexpectedly in June of 2006, I knelt by his side and swore I would see the audiologist he wanted me to. It seemed the least I could do. A sort of homage to my long-suffering father.

In August of 2006, my life changed forever.

I was in possession of a Phonak Savia Behind the Ear (BTE) Digital Hearing Aid.

In December of 2006, I got the second one.

I have never, in my life, regretted putting off something so important as I do getting these aids. I am not weak, dumb, or disabled. I am ENABLED!

The Hearing Aid

Phonak makes many models of hearing aids for all types and severities of hearing loss. I truly believe they are the best makers of hearing aids around. I did plenty of research before spending $2600.00 apiece for these.

My hearing aids are fully digital, state of the art types that have a clear earpieces and a clear little tube that goes around my ear. Behind my ear, out of sight, is where the magic happens. That is where the actual hearing aid sits.

I can manually turn it up or down for volume but rarely need to as it is fully automatic. It brings the high pitches I can't hear to life and adjusts to every environment I am in. If I am in a quiet setting, it picks up all the sounds just as you hear them. If I am in a crowd, it hones in on the person I am talking to and sort of mutes the chatter and noise so I can better understand the conversation. I can hear better than the person I am talking to because I am hyper focused on his or her voice while they are dealing with me and all the noise on the same level. It is amazing yet, when I wear the aids, I don't know any of this is happening. It just happens all behind the scenes or, should I say, behind the ear.

The aids have a phone adjustment that boosts conversations. If a phone is older, I need only to apply a tiny magnet on the receiver to activate the phone program. I have yet to figure out the whole phone thing so I take my aid out when on the phone but I am getting there!

These aids run on one A13 hearing aid battery. I buy these in bulk because I need to change them every 10 days to two weeks. The aid will warn me that the battery is getting low with a few beeps every 10 minutes until the battery dies.

Batteries aren't too expensive. I think I paid around 40 cents each in bulk. This is for the best I could buy. Cheaper brands cost less. It is a tiny price to pay to be able to join in again, to be able to answer questions by a soft-spoken person who is looking down, to catch every word that Simon and Paula say to each other on American Idol, and to hear my microwave beep. I couldn't hear that for years.

I couldn't hear birds for about eight years and didn't even know it! Every time I hear a bird, I well up in tears. Such a small thing yet such a huge one for a person who doesn't want to be isolated from the world.

As far as discretion, no one knows I am wearing the aids. Even up close, it's nearly impossible to see the clear tubing. But you know what? I don't care if people know. I went to a party last week and showed everyone there. Ironically, two people showed me theirs! I never would have guessed!

Phonak has given me back more than I ever even realized I lost. I had struggled for years to avoid the reality of not hearing things and missing pieces of conversation. I would nod and smile when I didn't quite understand what was said. I would watch my husband and, if he laughed, so would I. Later, I would ask what I laughed about.

Not now. Now, I spend my time marveling at the sounds I didn't know I couldn't hear. The microwave, my husband's high pitched, whisper soft alarm clock (if I have my aides in when it goes off), the cats meowing, the beeps that tell me to stop and show my bags so the stores can untag whatever they forgot to untag, water dripping, birds in the yard, I could go on and on.

My Phonaks have not failed me. I needed a few adjustments to get things just right for me and will continue to need adjustments as my hearing changes. As for durability, these are fine. I slip a battery into the little door and wear them. The rest is all done inside a two inch flesh colored plastic housing.

If only my father had this type of technology when he still had some hearing. If only he were here to see me proudly wearing the aids he begged me to get. If only I had stopped feeling sorry for myself and gotten these years ago!

The Phonaks come with a two year warranty and all the information you need as well as carrying cases and some batteries.

These are made JUST for me. These will not work for you or your mother or your friend. They are personalized for my exact hearing loss. Unlike those cheap all for one hearing aids that just amplify, these aids fill in the blanks that are missing from my hearing pattern. They do boost sound but, more, they add back the pitches I have lost. I cannot hear high-pitched sounds. Those sounds are responsible for certain letters which make up words. This is, if someone is talking about ice cream, I may think they said iced tea. If they say whisper, it may sound like blister.

With the aides, my speech discrimination is nearly flawless. I never have to turn to my husband and say, "What did she say?" or "Huh?"

One last thing. I thought I would embarrass my sons if I wore hearing aids. I mean, that makes me old and feeble, doesn't it? My 21 and 16 year old sons couldn't care less. They actually TELL me to put my aides in when they aren't and they are trying to talk to me. They have no issues AT ALL with the fact that I have hearing aids in my 40's. I think they are just happy that I am understanding them and their friends and not saying stupid things to cover for the fact that I totally missed the point of what was being said.

On Late Onset Hearing Loss

If you suffer from hearing loss, please don't wait. Get a hearing test and see if you are eligible for a hearing aid. And if you are, DO IT. My aids were not insured, unfortunately, but what price is there to hearing? I am paying them off slowly.

Please go to a good audiologist and get aids that are made for you - not the generic Miracle Ear types made just to boost sound. Those could actually damage your hearing more by exposing you to loud sounds!

The sooner you correct your hearing loss, the less time your brain has to forget what sounds you lost. My brain is relearning letters and sounds I haven't heard in years. My actual speech recognition without aids has gone UP because I wear these aids. My brain now recalls the lost sounds and can discriminate them. It "hears" them.

My Viewpoint on the Phonak Savia BTE Hearing Aid

Miraculous. Simply miraculous. I only wish I hadn't let my stubbornness and embarrassment stop me from getting these a few years ago. They will not stop my progressive hearing loss but they have given me time. Time to hear everything I can as well as I can.

There is no price tag and no true rating I can put on that.

5 stars - 50, 000 stars if I could rate that high. Now, when I laugh, it's because I heard the joke, not because everyone else is and I figure I might as well too. What an amazing feeling.

For more info on Phonak products - including their huge range of aids for every type of hearing loss, check out http://www.phonak.com