I'm a nurse and I have bilateral hearing aids. I've had them all my life. I use my stethoscope very regularly at work and so it was really important to me to be able to have a good sound quality.
When people have a considerable amount of hearing loss, they have to take out their hearing aids, because the pieces of the stethoscope, there's just not enough space for both of them to fit on the ear.
This is problematic because she can't hear the heartbeats without the hearing aids. She purchased a Bluetooth stethoscope and she has used amplified stethoscopes in the past, but many times the signal just wasn't loud enough.
Frustrated. It was just a challenge. I made it work, but still I knew there had to be something better.
Now that hearing aids have Bluetooth in them, when she visited this last time or throughout this last year we started talking about what new hearing aids might be able to do for her.
We also want to make this process simple, because as you're talking to the patient or their family you want to be able to hear what they are saying but then make it an easy transition to be able to listen to the heartbeat.
So, with her system it is very easy, by pushing a button on the hearing aid to switch from traditional hearing mode to being able to connect to her stethoscope and then she can easily, once she's done listening to the heartbeat go back to the regular listening mode.
I was amazed at how much things improved. I love how I can hear it way better. The volume quality is great and I'm able to hear patient's vitals much better than previously.
At Boys Town we try to incorporate the latest technology and individualize that for each patient.
Many patients come into our clinic with many different needs but we want to find that match between what's available with our technology and what their need may be in their everyday life.
For her to be able to use that and to listen throughout her daily life and have her job be much easier because her hearing is better is a big reward for me.
