Hearing News Watch

WASHINGTON, DC — The Over-the-Counter Hearing Aid Act of 2017 was introduced into the 115th Congress on Monday, March 20th. It is a bipartisan bill that would allow hearing aids to be sold over-the-counter (OTC) to address mild to moderate hearing loss. Like a similar bill introduced late last year, this bill was in sponsored by Sens. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.)

According to the World Health Organization over 5% of the world’s population has some degree of hearing loss. Inner ear hair cell and auditory nerve damage, typically caused by noise exposure, ototoxic drugs, viral or bacterial infection, and aging accounts for more than 80% of all cases of hearing loss. Regeneration of these damaged hair cells has been considered by

WASHINGTON, DC — In a message sent to Academy members this morning, the American Academy of Audiology (AAA) announced that Academy President Ian Windmill, PhD and President-Elect Jackie Clark, PhD met with health policy staff in Senator Elizabeth Warren’s (D-MA) office on March 15th. According to the announcement, the focus of the meeting was to share Academy members’ concerns with

ALEXANDRIA, VIRGINIA — On March 1st, the American Academy of Otolaryngology—Head and Neck Surgery Foundation (AAO-HNSF) published an updated clinical practice guideline for healthcare providers on benign paroxysmal positional vertigo (BPPV). The updated guideline, Clinical Practice Guideline: Benign Paroxysmal Positional Vertigo, provides evidence-based recommendations to healthcare providers on diagnosis and treatment of BPPV. Additionally, the guideline offers important patient information

JACKSONVILLE, FLORIDA — Shortly after arriving at the Jacksonville Zoo and Gardens in 2014, zookeepers began to have suspicions that their new gorilla, Kumbuka, was having trouble hearing. Those suspicions were ultimately confirmed late last week, thanks to a group of veterinarians and experts at Nemours Children’s Hospital, who diagnosed Kumbuka with profound hearing loss. Kumbuka’s hearing was evaluated by

CANBERRA, AUSTRALIA — Coinciding with World Hearing Day, the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) released a new report that puts the “hearing aid sector on notice”. The report, Issues around the sale of hearing aids, encourages industry reform, such as reconsidering commissions, disclosure and sales practices. The ACCC is Australia’s competition regulator and is tasked with ensuring that individuals and

As most know, accessibility and affordability of hearing aids is a hot button issue of national importance. On March 3, for example, the Journal of the American Medical Association Internal Medicine posted a summary of the issue surrounding over-the-counter hearing aids on their website. Authored by Senators Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) and Elizabeth Warren (D-Massachusetts) the article makes clear the Senators

BERLIN, GERMANY — The International Accessibility Conference on Hearing Loops and Hearing Technology, referred to as Future Loops, sponsored by Deutscher Schwerhörigenbund (DSB) and the International Federation of Hard of Hearing People (IFHOH), is scheduled to take place in from October 6-8th, 2017, in Berlin, Germany. The conference allows for vendors, service providers and specialists from around the world to collaborate

RESTON, VIRGINIA — The American Academy of Audiology (AAA), acknowledging the increasing roles for support personnel in the audiology clinic, has announced the creation of a new membership category: Audiology Technician Affiliate. The new membership option was decided upon after the Academy’s Audiology Assistant Subcommittee evaluated member feedback over the past two years, examining the role of technicians in other

Spoken verbal communication between people involves the relaying of information through the use of sound patterns in language. It is the assessment and remediation of this breakdown of sound patterns in the auditory pathway of an individual, an essential part of this communication process, that an audiologist is trained to do. In a Nature Scientific Report dated February 27, researchers