Hearing impairment

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So I received some wonderful hearing aids for Christmas from my partner and I have found that they help significantly with understanding spoken language. I have a weird combination of some hearing loss and Auditory Processing Disorder. Does anyone else here use hearing aids or any other hearing devices? How do they work for you? What issues have you found with them and the way they interact with your ASD?

I have a hearing aid that my doctor suggested in my right ear. I got it only about a year ago. I have trouble hearing people when they are talking and it helps me a lot.

I have two hearing aids.

Out of interest, have you have had an ABR test AND been officially diagnosed with an auditory processing disorder? If not, you may well have auditory neuropathy spectrum disorder which can present very similarly to auditory processing disorder but instead of being a central processing issue it's to do with how the cochlear passes information to the auditory nerve (in some cases it's due to absent/damaged auditory nerve but you wouldn't be getting good results with hearing aids if that was the case).

My teacher of the deaf thought I have it and my audiologist agrees it may be the case but isn't going to test for it as there is no cure - everything that can be done has been (short of a CI but those are reserved for more severe functional loss). But it is a pain as I do wonder whether it's my ears or my brain doing it.

Anyway, I find that hearing aids help in very quiet settings but, especially in noise, it just seems to amplify the clutter I hear. My hearing is also prone to odd things like seeming to temporarily mute itself. I find that they are too loud, but then I'm also sensitive to noise without hearing loss - how much of that is recruitment (SNHL) and how much of that is hypersensitivity (ASD), I couldn't tell you.

I simply can't wear mine for long periods of time - despite specialist programming and a variety of moulds etc.

For the people on this thread:
How did you get hearing aids? And do you have impaired hearing or is it due to autism/auditory processing you have the hearing aid?

Mine are NHS hearing aids. I got them through the audiology service (though my Nana has some better, private, ones). I have hearing aids due to sensorineural hearing loss but they have specialist programming owing to my processing difficulties.

I know someone (personally) who has NHS hearing aids for APD (but has a normal audiogram), though to my understanding they are programmed only to filter background noise rather than to compensate for varying loss across frequencies.

You (or your parents) would need to contact an audiologist with access to ENT doctors too, either through a local service or directly.

My first one came from a medical store near me and then my current one is from an audiologist. As for your second question, I genuinely don't know.

When I pay attention I can hear very well - it's the not paying attention part that is the hearing problem in my case.

Of course, being aspie - hearing someone talk in a crowd or noisy place is tough. In those cases I tend to lip-read.

I do have a bit of tinnitus which can be annoying from time-to-time. The tinnitus is probably a precursor of future hearing issues...

If your audiogram is predictable (e.g., doesn't seem to go up and down and have different configurations on each visit) then your loss is almost certainly sensorineural. Though there are circumstances where SNHL will also show an unpredictable response.

It could be tested objectively with an ABR but obviously wouldn't be worth it for responding to a thread.

Im going to a doctor for pain my ear. How can i bring out difficulties with hearing what people are saying (difficulties differentiating/separating background noise)?

I don't (I have quite the opposite problem with my hearing), but I've noticed a strong link between HI and autism.

The person whom you know personally, what hearing aid does s/he use?