A bit more background

Tons and tons of people... ok, 3 people, have asked me to put some more background information about the Esteem and how it works. I'm not so good at explaining it, but I'm going to do my best. If you are as pessimistic as I am about my ability to explain technology well though, here's a video they made about how it works. First, let's marvel at my success at making a hyperlink out of the word video, yay!

Ok, I'll try to keep this short. Basically the Esteem processor will be implanted a little bit behind my ear under the skin and it will have two sort of probes connected to it. These are called the driver and the sensor.

Side note, I'm looking at the brochure while writing this to make sure I explain it right, the ear is complicated! Kudos to my doctor for having learned all this stuff.

Anyway, the processor will be programmed to fit my specific hearing loss. The sensor will send sound (which it converts into electrical signals) from the ear drum to the processor which will increase (amplify) and filter the signals and then send them to the driver which moves the 3rd middle ear bone mechanically sending fluid through the cochlea.

I think the basic idea is that, like my hearing aids, it simply filters and amplifies everything but it uses my ear instead of a microphone to catch sound.

I'll have a little remote control that I can use to turn the Esteem off and on and change the volume.

I wonder if I'll want to sleep with it turned on at full volume. I don't know how you guys sleep with hearing, I'm very impressed and slightly mystified... I guess I'll find out.

I hope that explanation was good/helpful!