Looking for a more convenient hearing aid experience?
Well in this video, I'm gonna show you
how I can program your hearing aids
even if you're not in my clinic, coming up.
(upbeat music)
Hi, Guys, Cliff Olson, doctor of audiology
and founder of Applied Hearing Solutions in Anthem, Arizona,
and on this channel, I cover a bunch
of hearing related information
to help make you a better informed consumer.
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make sure you hit that Subscribe button.
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Tele-audiology is the utilization
of telecommunications like internet and video conferencing
to deliver hearing healthcare services to patients
who may not be able to have access
to these services otherwise.
In General, tele-audiology was designed
to increase accessibility
to individuals who live in rural communities
or who cannot make it into an audiology clinic.
Since the development of this technology,
it has been used to a large degree
by the Veterans Administration
for veterans who live too far away from a VA clinic.
Fortunately, some aspects of tele-audiology
are no longer limited to the VA and large hospitals.
They are starting to work their way
into local hearing aid clinics
thanks to the development of new hearing aid technology.
You see, in my clinic,
I have a lot of patients who travel to me
from out of town and even out of state
in order to receive hearing treatment.
The problem is they eventually go back home
and I cannot continuously provide them
with the high level of care
until they come back to visit me at my clinic again.
Up until now, I've been able to make small adjustments
in hearing aid programming based
on limited feedback that I get from a patient in an app,
but this doesn't really encompass the full scope
of what I wanna be able to do
in remote programming sessions.
But this is where today's video sponsor,
Phonak, has taken remote adjustment
of hearing aids to an entirely new level
with their new Marvel hearing aids.
With Phonak's Remote Support feature in their MyPhonak app,
I can now have a live programming session with a patient
even if they don't live in Arizona.
This is me working with a patient over 2,500 miles away
in New Hampshire.
And this is how it works.
First, we download the free MyPhonak app
on the patient's Apple or Android Smartphone
during the initial programming of their hearing aids
while they are in my office.
Then, in the eSolutions portion
of the programming software, I send the patient an invite
to their email address on file.
They can either accept this invitation,
or we enter the code manually into their app.
They then follow a simple sequence to setup their account
and pair their hearing aids to the app.
The software on my end tracks the progress
of this connection and lets me know
when the account is setup
and when the hearing aids are paired.
Then, we are set for a live programming session.
When the patient returns back home and it's time
for their scheduled remote session,
they click on the Remote Support button
inside of their MyPhonak app.
At the same scheduled time,
I click on Start Remote Support.
Inside of the patient's app,
they can accept or decline my video call.
Once connected to the patient's hearing aids
during the remote session,
I can review their data logging to see how many hours
they have worn their devices on average.
I can see the percentage of time that they have spent
in a variety of automatic program settings,
I can see how much time they have spent streaming,
I can see how often they have changed
into their manual program settings,
and I can even see what volume changes they have been making
in different listening environments.
I typically take screenshots of this data
and send it to patient
so they can see exactly what their hearing aids are doing.
And of course, I can make programming adjustments,
particularly if we're still trying to get a patient up
to their full hearing loss prescription
that we measured using Real Ear Measurement
during their initial visit.
And I can do all of this in real time
as they wear their hearing aids
so I can receive immediate feedback.
The MyPhonak app also has a Hearing Diary
that allows my patients to rate their hearing aid experience
and leave feedback.
I can then view this feedback
in my Hearing Diary Dashboard and respond if necessary.
If personalized care is what you want,
then this is about as personalized as it gets.
Thanks to this aspect of tele-audiology being utilized
inside of the Phonak Marvel hearing aids,
patients who wouldn't typically have regular access
to my clinic can now experience the same level of care
even if they live in a entirely different country.
The only thing that I encourage
in addition to this type of remote care,
is to find a local hearing care provider
who can handle routine hearing aid maintenance,
repairs and earwax removal,
which I recommend having done no less than two times a year.
At the end of the day,
new hearing aid technology is allowing us
to remove the barriers for your access
to high quality hearing healthcare,
and it is making it all extremely convenient.
Tele-audiology is here to stay,
and it is making it so you're no longer are you restricted
to the level of care that is being provided
in your geographical area,
and it is also making access to care more accessible
for individuals with mobility issues.
You can still receive terrific care
even if you are not sitting in the clinic
of your hearing care provider.
That's it for this video.
If you have any questions,
leave them in the comments section below.
If you liked the video, please share it,
and if you wanna see other videos just like this one,
go ahead and hit that Subscribe button.
I'll see you next time.
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