I'm interested in transition as my son turns 18 next April. He has bilateral digital hearing aids

casdix

This discussion was created from comments split from: Hi I'm Vicki. I worked as paediatric audiologist with children with complex needs. Ask away!.

casdix

Hi Vicki, I'm interested in transition as my son turns 18 next April. He has bilateral digital hearing aids. His loss is mild/moderate. He prefers not to wear his aids at home but will wear them for college which I find strange.

VickiKirwin

Hi Casdix,

Transition is more difficult for some young adults than others. Many take it in their stride where others find it much harder. Adult audiology services are very different to children's services - for example childrens services are usually a lot smaller and children get used to seeing the same people each time, and in adult services the young person is expected to take 100% responsibility for looking after hearing aids, reporting any problems, making appointments etc. In childrens services there is a high rate of young people who have other health, education or care needs, whereas the greatest proportion of people who use adult services are elderly and young people with quite complex needs are in a very small minority. Some hospitals are better than others at helping support young adults through these changes - giving them information they need to become independent service users, understanding their hearing loss, using other equipment with hearing aids that can help in socially, higher education or in work, ensuring they know where to find information if they need it. Do you feel your son is ready for transition and has been prepared for the changes? If your local adult service in at another hospital for example you could ask for a visit there before you are discharged from the children's service. And they should give you information about how to contact them, opening times etc.

Listening with hearing aids is hard work. Hearing is something we do naturally and takes no energy but listening is a skill or learned behaviour and takes effort. Therefore it's quite common for people to want a break from their hearing aids every now and again. However, the more you wear hearing aids the better our brains get used to listening with them and the easier listening with them becomes. If someone wears hearing aids just for part of the time then the brain gets mixed messages about what a normal level of sound is. So it's worth you and your audiologist trying to get to the bottom of why he doesn't wear his hearing aids at home because there are long periods of time when he's not at college such as during the holidays. Is it because of comfort that we could try and improve, is it because he finds them too noisy at home or just feels he doesn't need them there, or perhaps because he uses headphones a lot at home (music, computers, game consuls etc) and finds wearing hearing aids with them too annoying? There are lots of options that could be tried from reprogramming the hearing aids, providing different programmes for different listening situations, or using adaptations that allow easier use of hearing aids with other equipment etc.

Vicki