Hearing and Kids

The US, is facing a shortage of pediatric audiologists. With newborn hearing screening becoming essentially universal, the growing need for more pediatric audiologists becomes very clear. The number of audiologists who consider themselves pediatric audiologists is not known. Each state manages the information in a different way and, until recently, there was no certification identifying audiologists as having pediatric competence.

  The National Center on Early Childhood and Policy at Harvard has an item on its website discussing early brain development and its importance in early childhood. This is critical information for clinicians working with children with hearing loss and for parents and family members. This summary provides good evidence about early brain development and its significance. Only through understanding the

This post is a Reader’s Choice selection for 2013.   We all know hearing aids make things louder. But does it matter exactly how much louder and whether it makes it louder throughout the frequency spectrum? Everyone will say yes, it does. But how often do we check that hearing aids (or cochlear implants) are doing what we hope they

Dear Readers: During this holiday season, the editors at Hearing Health & Technology Matters (HHTM) are taking some time off. However, we are not leaving you without anything to read on our blog this week. Instead, we are publishing a special holiday edition filled with what we call our Readers’ Choices. The Readers’ Choices are the posts published on each

It is the holiday season and we are always looking for gifts for the children in our lives. If children have specific interests it is easy to find gifts. They need not be specific to hearing loss. However, there are some presents that might work especially well for a child with hearing loss.   Decorating hearing aids We would like

Adults are very good at knowing to look at the person who is speaking if they want to understand speech better. Adults with hearing loss and adults with normal hearing will turn to face the talker. This is more than being polite. We all get benefit from both seeing and hearing the person who is speaking. What about children?  

Today’s blog is written by Paige Stringer and myself. Paige is the Executive Director of the Global Foundation for Children with Hearing Loss and she is the person who developed the program in Vietnam and is continuing to build the program.   The Global Foundation For Children With Hearing Loss is seeking pediatric and educational audiologists to join our 2014

I presented workshops last week at the Arkansas Speech and Hearing Association and the Arkansas Academy of Audiology. I talked, as I usually do, about how to help children develop listening and spoken language skills. I spoke about how we take our lead from parents and how, since 95% of children with hearing loss are born to hearing parents, they

This Week’s Blog Post is contributed by Lisa Klop, AuD. Dr. Lisa Klop received her undergraduate and graduate degrees from the University of Wyoming before completing her Au.D. at Central Michigan University in 2005.  She practiced in ENT, hospital, and non-profit settings before opening her private practice in 2006.  She was a contract trainer with Siemens Hearing Instruments prior to

In an earlier post I wrote about the value of having a child with hearing loss learn a musical instrument. Lots of research has demonstrated that music helps develop the auditory brain. But, is every musical instrument appropriate for every child? A Parent’s Question A few days ago when I was doing a school visit for a third grader, her