Hearing Views

If you’re a practicing audiologist or a hearing instrument specialist and haven’t heard the latest news that Phonak will begin distributing hearing aids through Costco beginning in April, then you’ve probably been living under a rock. In response to the latest announcement, Phonak says that Costco serves a different clientele from the average professional office and that as a company

Today’s post concludes last week’s discussion on audiology assistants:   When we think about how audiology assistants can be utilized in the clinic, one of the first places to look for comparison is how they are being used in the Veteran’s Administration (VA). The VA has been successfully using assistants for many years. While the general job description for assistants

By Kevin Liebe, AuD We’ve heard the calls. We’ve seen the stats. We need assistants in audiology. As I had alluded to in a previous post, we simply do not have enough audiologists to “fill the gap” between supply and demand. A long-term gap could even potentially risk the creation of a new breed of professional, which I refer to

By Jack Rubinger It stands to reason that a 4-mile-long, ½-mile deep pit mine would require enormously powerful and gigantic trucks to haul iron ore from bottom to top. Along with the sheer enormity is the overpowering noise these trucks create. And that’s a major problem because noisy trucks are not in compliance with the Mine Safety and Health Administration

By Kevin Liebe, Au.D. In a previous post, Dr. Barry Freeman discussed some of the very real challenges confronting audiology: a high dropout rate, a high attrition rate, and the fact that too few audiologists are graduating to meet the demographic demands created by an aging Baby Boomer generation in the coming decades. Despite calls for increased enrollment in AuD

Editor’s Note: We thought Katherine Bouton’s post at The Better Hearing Consumer last week was worth sharing today with our readers at Hearing Views. She is the author of “Shouting Won’t Help: Why I – and 50 Million Other Americans – Can’t Hear You,” which was just re-released in paperback. It’s no secret that hearing aids and cochlear implants are not

By H. Christopher Schweitzer, Ph. D. Hearing professionals are in continuous combat with noise. Epic battles rage in perpetuity. From defending audiometric tests from ambient interference to providing consumers with better technology to “hear through the noise,” there is a never-ending quest to drive noise from the domain of hearing professionals. It is worthwhile to recall that the word “noise”

By Kevin Liebe, Au.D. We rarely discuss the spiritual impact when talking about the many negative consequences of hearing loss. Maybe it’s because discussing religion can be something of a taboo in our culture. Many of us cling to the old wisdom that you should, “never discuss politics or religion in polite company.” Today, however, Hearing Views will be going

Author’s Note: My earlier 2 part blog has now been out for over two months. The majority of the responses I received have been favorable and largely supportive. I feel it is now appropriate for me to respond.   By Maurice H. Miller, Ph.D. Dr. Kevin Liebe, audiologist and editor of this blog, stated to me his belief that the “billing

By Lily McCann There are 70 million deaf people worldwide. Current estimates suggest anywhere from 800,000 to 2 million deaf people live in the US and Canada. With this substantial figure in mind, it’s no wonder that special education is becoming more widely available and accessible in our society today. In a world in which they can’t hear danger and