Fourth appointment: Audiology Cochlear clinic

Note: this actually happened on the 6th of Feb but I forgot to post it to the blog oops!

Today was the mystery audiology clinic appointment. Well mystery solved it was hearing tests mainly. 

The first two tests were set up with a row of monitors and speakers in a semi circle arc type thing. I sat in this circle and watched a video of a guy speaking to me (it was only in the monitor right in front of me the others were not used for my test anyway). The idea was to simply repeat anything he said that I understood. I had to do it both with my hearing aids and without. Seriously stressful for me I hate having to strain to understand strangers  

The other hearing test was the standard test they give you all the time, anybody who has been to an audiology clinic will know what I’m on about but it’s basically they give you a button, you listen to sounds either via headphones or a speaker and you press the button when you hear something. 

After that it was a questionnaire with questions like how your hewing effects your life (social situations, work and so on).  

So that was that! Next up is some sort of “Candidate day” organised by the company Cochlear (the manufacturers of the implant I think I’m getting) I suspect it’s some sort of sales pitch but what the hell eh?

Third Appointment: MRI scan

So I lied a little about the next cochlear appointment in my last post, actually got another appointment the day after posting it a MRI scan on Tuesday.

Not a lot different from the CT scan I had just a few points though:

• Had to remove everything metal, glasses, hearing aids even my belt.
• Had to fill in a questionnaire about my health nothing to probing just if you have any implants (not yet!) or had any metal in your body, its all about the metal!
• They offered me ear plugs, put them in anyway but I doubt it would of made any difference.
• They put this plastic frame thing over my head to keep my head still, sorta reminded me of a medieval torture device, if they were plastic.
• The actual scanning tube thing is tight, not sure if they had me higher up in the tube to get my head closer to the actual scanner but lying down with my arms on my chest caused them to touch the top of the tube when getting pushed in so yeah you will probably want to keep them at your side.
• The thing vibrates quite a bit, so it must generate a bit of noise (hence the ear plugs)
• Was in the tube for about 10-15 min, its a little bit disorientating at first but then its just boring since its just a white plastic tube with a grey sticker stuck at the top of it. Did not feel a thing other then boredom.

Next appointment is the mysterious audiology appointment, assuming another appointment does not come in between then.