Interestingly enough I think that I solved my problem. My father passed away a few years ago and I grabbed his hearing aids. I tried using them the other day at the range and they work quite well. After some careful testing it appears that they have the high decibel cut off circuitry. Actually they were about $800-$1000 I think so I would assume that they had this circuitry in them anyway. Even using them in my ears with no amplification they worked almost as well as a good pair of muffs.
I assume that the inside the ear models are pretty much hearing aids anyway. Does anyone have any more detailed info on using hearing aids for this function?