Just prior to the Christmas break I blogged about the lack of cost effectiveness in seeing musicians versus clients who may need hearing aids. In that post I bemoaned the fact that we are now working in not only a market economy but also a market society, where policy and funding decisions are made based on the bottom line, rather than on what is required. In my own facility–the Musicians’ Clinics of Canada- it takes six musician clients to equal one hearing aid client, at least on a “bottom line financial basis.” If I saw only musicians at the Musicians’ Clinics of Canada, there would be no Musicians’ Clinics of Canada!
While this is unfortunately true, I didn’t fully expand on the other side of the coin. Accordingly, my post drew many responses from readers who were quick (and correct) to point out the other side of the coin.
I have been in the field of audiology for over 30 years and not only enjoy going to work, but have some really neat and interesting clients. And this is all because of the “Musicians’ Dividend.”
The Musicians’ Dividend is a phrase I like to use to describe the many and sundry benefits of working with those in the performing arts. These benefits have allowed me to be as clinically fresh today as I was in 1981, and my relative lack of hair today is not related to my pulling it out.
The Musicians’ Dividend means that I get to use all of my audiology training with these clients. I get to use psycho-acoustics, room and ear mold acoustics, noise/music prevention strategies, hearing protectors, hearing aids, neurophysiology, and even some counseling skills. In short, I get to use something from each and every course that I took in my audiology training.
The Musicians’ Dividend means that I get to use a non-medical rehabilitation/prevention model of intervention. The medical model works well for many of my clients and is an important starting point; the Musicians’ Dividend allows me to view a client’s condition as optimal or non-optimal, rather than as pathological or non-pathological. If it’s not optimal, audiologists and other hearing health care professionals are ideally suited to solve this problem. It becomes more of an engineering approach where a solution exists; we just have to find it.
The Musicians’ Dividend means that from time to time, we get to see hard of hearing musicians who require amplification or other assistive listening devices. I can assure you that working with them is fascinating. These people have a very well-developed transverse temporal gyrus and can hear things that I, as a normal hearing non-musician, could only dream of hearing. Musicians can hear and appreciate differences that are very close to our just-noticeable-difference thresholds. Regardless of their cochlear status, musicians are superhuman listeners.
The Musicians’ Dividend can also be used for marketing, albeit this is a very dangerous slope. Intuitively one can argue that if I can make a musician happy with hearing aids, then I can make anyone happy. I do see many non-musician clients who come to my office for hearing aids assuming that I will be able to provide them with the very best amplification possible. However, this assumption may or may not be true.
In many cases with hard of hearing musicians, the ultimate hearing aid fitting is based on a philosophy that “less may be more” and when it comes to music, this is probably true. This is not typically the case for speech, especially in noise. Caution should be exercised with this aspect of the Musicians’ Dividend. It is quite easy to start believing your own advertising, even when it is erroneous.
I do receive many referrals from relatives and friends of my musician clients, and I am grateful for this since it does add to my bottom line. This allows me to spend the necessary time with my clients and still cover my rent and secretarial expenses. This is a very important aspect of the Musicians’ Dividend, but it is something to be cautious about.
The Musicians’ Dividend has allowed me to practice in this field for over 30 years and I enjoy it thoroughly. I am delighted to be able to sit back from time to time and just see a 4-year-old with otitis media- something that any new audiologist can handle- but I am even more delighted when I see a 24-year-old musician who is interested in ensuring that they can still hear and enjoy their music 30 years from now.
