NEWS & VIEWS
March-April 2021
212-769-HEAR
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President's Report
by Jon Taylor
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I would like to start this month’s column by welcoming back Demi Demetracopoulos to the chapter Board. Demi brings a much-needed younger perspective that we hope will improve our outreach to young adults. We also look forward to her assistance in increasing our social media presence—and we may take advantage of her graphic design skills.
For those of you who are on Facebook, please check our Facebook page from time to time and “Like” posts. The Board has started a committee to improve our page so that members will find it more engaging.
I recently filed a complaint with the FCC about the Saturday Night Live captioning, which often lags far behind the actual speech and is out of sync with the video. It is very frustrating hearing laughter and waiting several seconds to see what was said. If Lauren Schechter can provide almost simultaneous captions for our meetings, NBC should be able to synchronize captions, particularly since there is an 8 o'clock rehearsal for the 11:30 show, which is scripted. Although the cast may not stick to it, the script provides a head start for the captioner. Filing the complaint was easy. If you are not satisfied with TV captions, register your complaint at: fcc.gov/accessibilitycomplaints.
More on captioning: Jerry Bergman has been working hard to get the Metropolitan Opera to caption its streamed events. We hope to have good news to report soon.
At our May 4 chapter meeting, three top New York City cochlear implant surgeons will discuss advances in cochlear implant technology. They will also address the changing standards for qualification, auditory training after implantation, and assistive devices offered by the three FDA-approved manufacturers. Our chapter's professional adviser, Dr. Justin Golub from Columbia, will lead the discussion, which will also include Dr. Sujana S. Chandrasekhar from Mt. Sinai and Dr. George Alexiades from Weill Cornell.
This meeting is a timely one for me. In March, Dr. Alexiades implanted a CI in my right ear that was activated on April 8. My surgery and recovery were relatively easy. The operation was at 9:30 in the morning and I was home by about 3:30. I expect that mapping, getting accustomed to the new sounds, and auditory training will be more challenging for me than the actual surgery was. I am happy to report that captioning was provided in the recovery room, and that Lauren Schechter captioned my activation, all courtesy of Weill Cornell. If you have medical appointments you feel should be captioned, don’t be shy about asking your provider.
Although our virtual meetings have been wonderful, we miss seeing you in person and I miss baking cookies for our meetings As more people get vaccinated, it will become safer for us to return to having meetings in person, though we will explore the possibility of having hybrid meetings that will also be available on Zoom. Most people do not have serious reactions to the shots. In any case, immunity to Covid is worth the generally mild side effects of the shot. So please make an appointment.
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SAVE THE DATES
HLAA-NYC Virtual Chapter Meetings
A Zoom link, with instructions, will be emailed beforehand
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Tuesday, May 4, 2021
6:00 to 7:30 PM
Three top New York City cochlear implant surgeons will discuss advances in cochlear implant technology, changing standards for qualification, auditory training after implantation, and assistive devices offered by each of the three FDA-approved manufacturers. The discussion will be led by Dr. Justin Golub, the chapter’s professional advisor, who is a surgeon at Columbia Presbyterian. He will be joined by Dr. Sandra Chandrashekur from Mt. Sinai and Dr. George Alexiades from Weill Cornell.
Tuesday, June 1, 2021
6:00 to 7:30 PM
We will announce the winner of the 2021 Albert B. Chen Scholarship, a $5,000 award for high school seniors with hearing loss. The winner will then give a short talk about how to give back to the hearing-loss community. Our featured speaker will be Rebecca Alexander, author of "Not Fade Away: A Memoir of Senses Lost and Found." Despite being deaf and nearly blind as a result of a rare variant of Usher Syndrome, Rebecca is an award-winning author, psychotherapist, group fitness instructor, disability advocate, and extreme athlete. She will talk about resilience in the face of adversity.
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March Chapter Meeting
Whatever Happened to OTC Hearing Aids?
Meeting Summary Plus Link to Video
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Kevin Franck, senior vice president for the technology company Frequency Therapeutics, is a leader in developing products for people with hearing loss. He is also the incoming board chair of the Hearing Loss Association of America. Kevin began his talk about over-the-counter hearing aids by noting that in 2016 the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine published the book Hearing Health Care for Adults: Priorities for Improving Access and Affordability, which focuses on steps to take to support and manage hearing health, including the establishment of over-the-counter, wearable devices. In 2017, the Over‑the‑Counter Hearing Aid Act was signed into law.
“HLAA was involved with this every step of the way,” Kevin said. Thumbs up for OTC aids came from HLAA, the Consumer Electronics Association, and the American Doctors of Audiology. and thumbs down from organizations that make money selling hearing aids because they didn’t want competition. The American Academy of Audiology and the American Speech Language Hearing Association occupy the middle ground. But I think people with hearing loss are pretty excited to have more options.”
OTC aids are intended for people with mild to moderate hearing loss. Although an OTC aid should include the same fundamental technology as a hearing aid and should be adjustable to the user’s hearing needs, it can be obtained from a dispenser without a license. During the question and answer session, Kevin said he was unsure whether OTC aids would bring down the cost of that OTC aids would lead to reduced costs for standard hearing aids Medicare coverage of hearing aids. He also noted that OTC aids do not have built-in T-coils.
According to Kevin, “The FDA has not yet addressed OTC hearing aids issues, in part because the organization is busy dealing with COVID-related situations. The congressional sponsors of the bill have been saying, ‘Hey, we wrote this bill. It became a law. FDA, what's going to happen?’ Meanwhile, People are using PSAPS and Internet hearing aids as a proxy for what these over‑the‑counter hearing aids may be. For now, we're just waiting.”
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April Chapter Meeting
Mastering the Challenges of
Living Well with Hearing Loss
Meeting Summary Plus Link to Video
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Michael A. Harvey, PhD, a clinical psychologist in private practice and author, provides training and consultation on mental health issues related to hearing loss and teaches audiologists about motivational interviewing and the psychological aspects of patient care. He has published more than 50 articles in the field. His latest books are Listen with the Heart: Relationships and Hearing Loss and The Odyssey of Hearing Loss: Tales of Triumph.
Over the course of the 90-minute chapter meeting, Dr. Harvey shared stories of clients facing a variety of challenging issues related to their hearing—including anger, depression, frustration, and social anxiety. Interspersed with the stories, Dr. Harvey offered many insights. Here are three:
- Use cognitive behavior therapy (CBT) strategies to change negative thoughts into positive ones.
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Be inspired by Tuesdays with Morrie, Mitch Albom's memoir about the life-affirming lessons he learned while visiting his former sociology professor, Morrie Schwartz, who was suffering from ALS (also known as Lou Gehrig's disease).
- To an audience member who shared that she was ready to get hearing aids, Dr. Harvey said, "To make a decision to get a hearing aid or glasses doesn't mean we have to feel thrilled about it. It means that we value the pros more than the cons."
To hear all Dr. Harvey’s stories and learn about these resources and others, watch a YouTube video of this meeting on hearinglossnyc.org.
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Advocacy Seminar Attracts
More than 300 Viewers
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An online advocacy seminar presented last month by HLAA’s New York State Association was attended by over 300 people, according to HLAA’s national office. The event, “Hearing Accessibility and the Law: Your Rights and How to Obtain Them,” was organized by Chapter member Jerry Bergman and hosted by the national office as its March nationwide webinar offering.
The seminar featured three attorneys with many years of experience dealing with disability rights: John Waldo, an attorney representing people with hearing loss; John Herrion, director of disability rights for the New York State Division of Human Rights; and Marc Fliedner, director of the Protection and Advocacy for Individual Rights Program of Disability Rights New York.
John Waldo explained that achieving accessibility is generally a three-step process that begins with an inquiry requesting that an accommodation be provided. When such inquiries are denied or ignored, Waldo recommends sending a letter repeating the request and indicating that the accommodation to provide “effective communication” is required under law. He noted that when such letters are sent by attorneys they usually get the attention of venue decision-makers and result in settlements. The third step, filing a lawsuit, is often avoided, Waldo noted, when the other side realizes that the cost of litigation is likely to far exceed the cost of becoming more accessible.
John Herrion and Marc Fliedner explained that once their state agencies determine that a federal, state or local human rights law is being violated, they arrange to represent the individual and pursue a settlement. All three attorneys noted that no financial payment is required for them to take on cases.
Among the issues addressed by the panelists during the Q&A period were: obtaining disability rights in the workplace; accessibility under law at airports and on airplanes; accessibility in healthcare, from hospitals and physicians’ offices to telemedicine services.
Two handouts mentioned were “What Is a Public Accommodation?” and “Reasonable Accommodation–Employment,” both from Disability Rights New York. Click here to download the former and here to download the latter.
To access a YouTube video of the seminar, click here. The video will soon be available on the HLAA website.
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Free Captions Coming to Zoom |
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Largely through the efforts of hearing health advocate and HLAA-NYC member Shari Eberts, who launched a petition that garnered some 80,000 signatures, Zoom will make its ASR (automatic speech recognition) captions—Live Transcript—available on free accounts. For more information on how to enable live captions and transcription click here and see Shari's post in the Blogs section below.
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Difficulty Accessing Podcasts? |
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The Disability Rights Advocates non-profit law firm is investigating how to make podcasts more accessible to people with hearing loss. If you or someone you know are having problems with not being able to access podcasts because of an absence of transcripts or captions, please email Christina Brandt-Young, Managing Attorney, DRA, at cbrandt-young@dralegal.org.
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Our Favorite Hearing Loss Blogs |
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Katherine Bouton
Tips for Post-Pandemic Life
On the one-year anniversary of the World Health Organization’s declaration of Covid as a pandemic, we are beginning to see the light ahead. Vaccine numbers are soaring, restaurants are offering indoor dining, people are traveling. Pandemic “pods” are expanding to include more than the two or three friends or family that many have depended on for company. Soon enough, there will be weddings, awards ceremonies, even private parties. Are you ready? Read more of this post.
Shari Eberts
Zoom Makes ASR Captioning Free for People with Hearing Loss
Success! Zoom just announced it will provide high-quality ASR captions (Live Transcript) FREE for people with hearing loss, as well as other groups who require this feature for accessibility reasons. Click here to request access. This feature will be rolled out to all free accounts by Fall 2021. Since the start of the pandemic, we have been asking Zoom to do just this. We explained that captions are our ramps and that we should not be forced to pay for the accessibility feature that we need to communicate well on Zoom. They have heeded our call. Read more of this post.
Gael Hannan
Explaining Our Hearing Loss to Others
For readers of my weekly column, some of you may have noticed my absence for the past few weeks. If you haven’t – well, I’ve missed you! I’ve been busy —being sick with Covid. There, I’ve said it. If you’re like me, you’ve spent the entire last year trying to do everything right. You’ve followed the guidelines, sorting through the advice, separating scientific facts (as known) from hysterical fiction. Doing what’s necessary to prevent transmission of the horrible virus that has held the world in its grip for over a year. We distance, wear masks, shelter at home and congregate in small groups as allowed by local health jurisdictions. Read more of this post.
Addendum to this post: Gael reported that she is feeling much better and the tinnitus has subsided—somewhat.
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Join HLAA "Closed" Facebook Group
Connect with HLAA Members from Across the Country
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The Hearing Loss Association of America – Official Community and Support closed Facebook group enables members to ask questions, share experiences, and offer support on how to live with hearing loss. Due to its “closed” status, members can comment and post without having either show up on their newsfeed. According to the group's administrators, "The primary focus and goal of HLAA is to create a safe haven and community for those who experience this world with hearing loss." To access and join the group, click here. |
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Having Trouble with Closed Captioning on TV? |
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Closed captioning (CC) gives people with hearing disabilities access to television programming—and provides a critical link to news, entertainment, and information—by displaying the audio portion of broadcasts as text on the television screen.
If you're unhappy with the quality of the closed captioning on a specific program, make your voice heard by filing a complaint with the FCC. It only takes a few minutes. Click here.
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Support HLAA - Become a Member |
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As the nation's leading organization for people with hearing loss, we provide information, education, support, and advocacy for the millions of Americans coping with hearing loss. Join online or download a membership form.
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Searching for the perfect way to observe a loved one's birthday, anniversary, or special occasion, OR to honor the memory of someone special? Please consider making a gift to HLAA-NYC Chapter to support our efforts.
You can donate online or by mailing a check (payable to HLAA-NYC) to HLAA-NYC Chapter, P.O. Box 602, Radio City Station, New York, NY 10101. Include name and address. An acknowledgement will be mailed. Donations are tax deductible.
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