I have been watching this incredibly interesting discussion on You Tube, called “The Creative Destruction of Medicine” featuring Eric Topol and Don Jones.

The topic is so relevant to changes in access to hearing aids and management of hearing. We are empowered and indeed almost required today to be more in charge of our own health. Today we are, and need to be, very knowledgeable consumers of health management.

Managing our own hearing is incredibly sensible, which is why at Blamey & Saunders we have developed a model and service where you set up you own hearing aids and save lots of money, but you are connected to our audiology support services as little or as much as you like. In fact, if you are managing your own self fit hearing aid, you have an incredibly good alert to any changes in your hearing, that might have some underlying cause. Supposing you have used our system to set up your hearing aids, and one day you feel they don’t sound so loud. Of course you do all the checks first, to make sure the hearing aid isn’t blocked up with ear wax. But then you can reset your hearing aids – supposing you need to make some significant changes – then you have some significant data to take to your doctor, about your hearing.  And you also know that you need to go to your doctor.
The UCSD video has some very, very interesting issues, and I recommend it to anyone interest in health care. Watch it with an open mind. I love it.

One of the things are speakers discuss is the challenge of changing behaviour  I spend a lot of time giving talks, advising people that the audiogram is a test with limited value. But everyone thinks they need an audiogram. Do they know why?

A generality in medicine is to be somewhat self managed, read widely and make informed decisions for yourself – especially in hearing aids.