Cochlear implant and hearing aid families are cordially invited to join The Children's Hearing Institute at the taping of a special kids' concern show highlighting the challenges of hearing impairment and how to protect your hearing. The show, hosted by Radio Disney AM 1560's DJ Jenn, will be taped at Bridgewater's Sunday, October 7 at 11 AM. The show will feature professional experts from The Beth Israel/New York Eye and Ear Cochlear Implant Center, including co-directors Drs. Ronald Hoffman, Jane Madell, and Simon Parisier; Drs. Ana Kim, Christopher Linstrom and George Alexiades; and our outstanding team of audiologists, speech-language therapists and educators. During the show, the experts and DJ Jenn will take questions from the audience. Radio Disney AM 1560 will air the show during October's National Children's Health Month. The show will kick off a year-long awareness-raising campaign during which a CHI-sponsored “Hearing Tip of the Week” will air every Friday for 52 weeks.
Radio Disney AM 1560 New York is a 24/7 radio station devoted to kids, tweens and families. Radio Disney AM 1560 covers the entire tri-state region. Kids help pick the music that is played and are encouraged to interact via a toll-free line to the Radio Disney studio. The network's current playlist, driven by listener requests and representing major record labels, includes recording artists Miley Cyrus as Hannah Montana, Jonas Brothers, Vanessa Hudgens, Corbin Blue, Ashley Tisdale, Aly & AJ, Rihanna, B5 and Jesse McCartney.
Radio Disney is the No. 1 destination for kids, tweens and families on the radio. It is available to 97% of the U.S. on over 50 terrestrial radio stations and through most of South America. In the U.S. it is also available on Radio Disney.com, XM and Sirius satellite radio, iTunes Radio Tuner, XM/DIRECTV and mobile phones. Kids, tweens and families can also download Radio Disney programming via the iTunes Music Store. Radio Disney brand extensions include multiple Radio Disney Jams CDs from Walt Disney Records.
PARKING: CENTRAL PARKING SYSTEMS outdoor parking, corner of Beekman and Pearl Streets. Entrance to lot is on Pearl Street. After parking, walk east on Beekman Street one block and turn right on Front Street. Fulton Market Building is on left.
FROM EAST SIDE OF MANHATTAN: Take FDR Drive to Exit 2, “Brooklyn Bridge/Manhattan Civic Center”. Bear right down ramp toward Civic Center. Make a left at end of ramp (at first stoplight) onto Pearl Street. Follow Water/Pearl Streets 3 blocks south to the Seaport (on the left).
FROM BROOKLYN BRIDGE: Follow signs for FDR Drive/Pearl Street. Go down ramp to light and turn right onto Pearl St. Follow Water/Pearl Street 3 blocks south to the Seaport (on the left).
FROM WEST SIDE, GEORGE WASHINGTON BRIDGE, LINCOLN & HOLLAND TUNNELS: Take Westside Highway (West Street) south around tip of Manhattan and follow signs for FDR Drive. Go through underpass. Take Exit 1, “South Street” (immediately on right as you exit underpass). Follow South Street north to the Seaport. Pier 17 is on right, Fulton Market Building is on left. Make left on Beekman Street.
FROM BROOKLYN BATTERY TUNNEL: Follow signs for FDR Drive. Take Exit 1, “South Street.” Follow South Street north to the Seaport. Pier 17 is on right; Fulton Market Building is on left. Make a left on Beekman Street .
BY SUBWAY: Take 2, 3, 4, 5, J, Z or M trains to Fulton Street; A and C trains to Broadway/Nassau. Walk east on Fulton to Cobblestone area of Seaport. Make left on Front Street.
BY BUS: Take the M15 (South Ferry Sign) down 2nd Avenue to Fulton Street.
Sound Off on Hearing Loss
Following is "Sound Off," in the May 2007 issue of Parents magazine.
This story cites hearing loss as the country's leading birth defect, and tells the story of Luca Trama, who received a cochlear implant from Dr. Ronald Hoffman of The Beth Israel/New York Eye and Ear Cochlear Implant Center. It quotes Children's Hearing Institute founder Dr. Simon Parisier on the importance of infant screening. Parents also cites our award-winning website as a superb educational resource for families facing the challenges of hearing loss.
Sound Off on Hearing Loss
Hearing loss is surprisingly common in babies – but a shocking number of children aren't diagnosed or treated until much too late.
By Ilisa Cohen
The Most Common Birth Defect
Beth Trama, of Smithtown, New York, was watching her son, Luca, sleep peacefully in the hospital nursery, when the newborn next to him let out a loud, high-pitched scream. Luca didn't wake up. Trama couldn't believe that the noise didn't startle him, but she assumed he'd just gotten used to being with all those crying babies -- until he failed his hearing screening the next day.
You're probably surprised to find out that hearing loss is the most common birth defect. Every day, about 33 babies are born in the U.S. with a hearing impairment. But the news hasn't gotten through to parents – in fact, only 1 percent of new and expectant moms ranked hearing loss as their top concern about their child's health, according to a survey by the Alexander Graham Bell Association for the Deaf and Hard of Hearing, in Washington, D.C.
A Recessive Gene
Many parents figure their baby isn't at risk if they don't have a history of deafness in their family. However, about 90 percent of deaf children are born to hearing parents. Deafness can be caused by a dominant gene – meaning one or both parents are deaf – or by a recessive gene, so a child can inherit the trait even if no family members are hearing-impaired. That's what happened to Luca. After his diagnosis, doctors discovered that both of his parents had a recessive gene for a genetic disorder that damages the hair cells in the inner ear so they can't carry sound to the auditory nerve. As a result, Luca is severely deaf in both ears.
Hearing loss can also be caused by many nonhereditary factors, including infections, prematurity, severe jaundice, or a lack of oxygen during delivery, says Ellen M. Friedman, MD, chief of pediatric otolaryngology at Texas Children's Hospital, in Houston. Unfortunately, most of theses causes aren't preventable.
Testing 1, 2, 3
You can't count on your baby's doctor to identify a problem – most pediatricians don't have the proper equipment to do infant hearing tests in their offices.
Before you give birth, check with your hospital to make sure that hearing testing is part of their newborn screening process. If it's not, or if you give birth somewhere other than a hospital, ask your pediatrician to recommend a pediatric audiologist or otologist to screen your baby within her first three weeks. Hearing tests for newborns are mandatory in 42 states and in Washington, D.C. (although small hospitals may be exempt). “However, every baby's hearing should be tested at birth so that parents can get help quickly if there's a problem,” says Simon C. Parisier, MD, cofounder of the Children's Hearing Institute, in New York City. Testing is especially crucial because research has shown that parents' impressions about their infant's hearing are often wrong. Even deaf babies can coo and make gurgling sounds. If you're not sure whether your baby has been tested, contact your hospital to check her records.
How it works
A hearing test is easy and painless. Doctors use one of two measures: an otoacoustic emissions (OAE) test, which measures the response by the hair cells inside the ear when they're stimulated by sound, or an auditory brain-stem response (ABR) test, which measures brain-wave activity in response to sound. Both of these tests are given while the baby is asleep, and for babies, they're both pass-or-fail: They only tell doctors if a baby can hear 30 decibels (the sound of a whisper), which is the definition of normal hearing. If your baby fails the initial screening test, you need to make an appointment with an audiologist for more comprehensive testing in order to confirm the results, determine the severity of the loss, and get proper treatment.
Treatment
“I wish I'd pushed the doctors to treat my baby's hearing loss sooner,” says Heather Conar, of Nashville. Her son, Jacob, failed his hearing screening at birth, but he wasn't officially diagnosed with hearing loss and fitted for a hearing aid until he was more than a year old. “They thought the trouble was caused by fluid in his ears that would drain, but it turns out his hearing loss was permanent from the beginning,” she says.
Doctors initially thought that Jacob had conductive hearing loss, which is caused by a blockage in the middle ear that makes sounds muffled. Babies who've had frequent ear infections can experience this type of mild, temporary loss due to fluid buildup in the ear. It can usually be corrected by putting tubes in the ears to drain the liquid. Sensorineural hearing loss, the kind that Jacob actually has, is more serious -- and usually permanent – because it's caused by a problem with the child's auditory nerve. A child will need a hearing aid, which Jacob now has, or a cochlear implant (an electronic device that is surgically implanted behind the ear to stimulate the auditory nerve) in order to hear normally.
Even if your baby passes her infant screening test, it's important to continually pay attention to her behavior and reactions to sound, says Dr. Friedman. Hearing loss can be progressive or can occur as your child gets older. Risk factors for delayed-onset hearing loss include a family history of childhood hearing loss, recurring or persistent ear infections for at least three months, head trauma, and serious infections like bacterial meningitis. If you're ever concerned, take your child to get a hearing test.
Don't Delay
Sadly, many kids aren't diagnosed with hearing loss until age 2 – which is way beyond the critical window for developing speech and language skills. Your child learns to speak correctly by hearing sounds around him and listening to your voice. If he can't hear during his first six months, he's missing an important opportunity. Children with a hearing impairment often learn new words more slowly than other children, understand and produce shorter sentences, have trouble with quiet speech sounds like the “s,” “sh,” “f,” “t,” and “k,” and don't do well academically.
While it's never too late to get help, experts say that it's ideal to start early intervention – including speech and listening training – before 6 months of age. With an early diagnosis and hearing aids or other interventions, most kids who are deaf or hard-of-hearing will develop language skills comparable with their peers by first grade. Children as young as 3 months can be fitted with hearing aids, and those with profound hearing loss can get a cochlear implant at age 1. Cochlear implants have been controversial within the deaf community because they try to “fix” the trait that's central to deaf culture. “Having known many deaf people, I used to be more wary of implants, but now I've seen how fantastic they can be for kids,” says Dr. Friedman. Children who have hearing aids or cochlear implants usually go to mainstream schools, can speak relatively clearly, and are less isolated than those who rely only on sign language.
To make the best decision for your child, it's important to speak to doctors, audiologists, and other parents. “We have a whole ‘new family' of people who've helped keep us informed, find schools, interview surgeons, and do anything necessary to help our son,” says Beth Trama. Luca got a cochlear implant just a few months before his first birthday. Now 3 ½, he's communicating well, attending nursery school, and, most important, says Trama, “He's a happy, spunky little kid.”
Can You Hear Me Now?
Even babies who pass the newborn hearing screening can develop hearing loss later on. If your baby doesn't reach these milestones, it's a good idea to have her hearing retested.
At 3 months
- Turns her eyes or head toward loud sounds
- Begins to imitate some sounds
- Smiles at the sound of your voice
At 7 months
- Looks at you when you call her name
- Responds to sound by making sounds
- Babbles chains of sounds like “ba-ba-ba-ba”
At 12 months
- Responds to “no” and simple requests
- Says words like “dada” and “mama”
- Understands common phrases like “bye-bye”
At 24 months
- Says at least 15 words
- Uses two-to four-word phrases
- Repeats words overheard in conversation
The Sun Has Finally Come Out For Alex
With his new cochlear implant, our son is able to talk and sing. The transformation is miraculous.
The following story written by Lydia Denworth, is featured in the April 10, 2006 issue of Newsweek magazine. It highlights the developmental success of Alex Denworth, who received a cochlear implant at The New York Eye & Ear Infirmary Cochlear Implant Center December 2005. His surgeon was Children's Hearing Institute Founder, Simon C. Parisier, MD., who says he is delighted with Alex's progress.
April 10, 2006 issue - My son Alex told me about his day recently. He played cars with Max and Aidan, sang the "Mr. Sun" song and danced—a typical day for a 2-year-old. His report, however, was anything but routine. It was the first real conversation we had ever had. Alex is hearing-impaired. Every word he utters is hard-won, but his battle got a lot easier a few months ago when he received a cochlear implant.
The success of the implant marks the first time in a year that he has done better than expected, not worse. The process of uncovering Alex's hearing loss was long and frustrating—like falling down steps in slow motion. Now we're at the bottom of the stairs, but we're looking at where we came from, getting ready to climb back up.
We live in New York, a state that requires newborn hearing screenings, which Alex passed. But at 16 months, he had just started walking and could say only "hi," "bye" and "Mama." He qualified for physical and cognitive therapy, but not for speech. At 18 months, when he had no more words, we went for the first hearing test. Alex failed, but his ears were full of fluid. We spent the next two months trying to clear up the fluid for a new hearing test.
You'd think it would be obvious that he couldn't hear well, but it wasn't. He answered to his name, he reacted to music and he compensated well by using visual cues. His mistakes were subtle, like holding up his hands when you held out a washcloth and said you wanted to wash his face.
Then one January night in 2005, his brothers heard their father's key in the door and ran to greet him. Alex didn't react until I tapped his shoulder and pointed. Then he tore down the hall into his Dad's arms. My heart sank. In February, after tubes had cleared up the fluid, tests showed that Alex also had underlying nerve damage that had caused moderate-to-severe hearing loss in both ears—he could hear a motorcycle, but not a vacuum cleaner; normal conversation sounded like whispers.
He had never heard the lullabies I'd sung or the "I love you's" I'd murmured. I felt I had failed him by not figuring it out sooner. It was a relief, though, to finally have an explanation for what he couldn't do. No matter how many times I read "Goodnight Moon," he was never going to be able to point to the cow jumping over the moon if he couldn't hear the word "cow." We were told he could catch up. In March, he got hearing aids, and in April, he started speech therapy five days a week.
In June, a CT scan revealed that Alex had congenitally deformed cochleae. He also had a condition that meant things could get worse: a bump on the head could cause him to lose his remaining hearing. "It might never happen," said our doctor. But by fall, he had lost all hearing in the right ear. I was in a daze for a week. I hadn't realized how fiercely I'd been clinging to the "moderate" diagnosis.
We started talking about cochlear implants. Unlike a hearing aid, which amplifies sound, an implant digitizes sound and sends it via magnets and electrodes directly to the brain. Alex's vocabulary had grown from five words to more than 200 in six months of using hearing aids, but he wasn't saying sounds like "k" or "t" at all. ("Come, Tom" sounded like "Um, Om.") If testing proved that Alex wasn't hearing high-frequency sounds like k and t, he could get an implant.
With a wrenching switch of emotional gears, my husband and I immediately hoped Alex's hearing would be declared bad enough to qualify. The success stories amazed us: implanted children in mainstream classrooms speaking beautifully, nearly indistinguishable from hearing classmates.
Alex had his surgery in December, making him one of approximately 100,000 people worldwide who use implants (up from 5,000 in 1990). After a month, the external parts were turned on—almost a year to the day he didn't hear his father at the door.
We'd been warned it would take months to see progress, but the next day Alex said "cake" complete with the initial "k" sound. Then he pointed to "Blue's Clues" on the TV and said "mailbox" on cue. He has new words and sentences nearly every day. The combination of his anatomy, his residual hearing and the language he already had made him ideal for this device.
Years of speech therapy, hearing tests and doctors loom ahead, but for the moment, I am content to marvel at the gift my little boy has been given. When he finishes telling me about his day by singing a shaky version of "Mr. Sun," no lullaby has ever sounded sweeter to my ears—or his.
Denworth lives in New York City.
Click here to see original article in Newsweek
Several deaf-theater groups are struggling to stay afloat after the federal government mysteriously cut funds for cultural programs for the deaf around the country 16 months ago.
Officials at the Department of Education, which administered the program that distributed some $2 million a year in grants, said they did not see the change coming and did not know who in Congress had ordered the cut in December 2004. "All we know is that we no longer have the authority" to award those grants, said Lou Danielson, the research director for the Office of Special Education Programs.
The program was part of landmark legislation that promised people with disabilities equal educational opportunities. But without the grants, the affected organizations, which produce theatrical fare seen in schools, libraries and other public places throughout the country, are worried about staying solvent.
The National Theater of the Deaf, based in West Hartford, Conn., the group that many credit with pioneering the field, had been getting $687,000 a year from Washington until the last of its federal grants ran out in mid-2005. Since 1967, it has been producing shows that feature deaf and hearing actors who communicate in a combination of American Sign Language and spoken English. The company estimates that its shows have been seen by 3.5 million people throughout the world. Now the theater has gone two years without putting on a show for adults and without conducting its summer training academy for deaf and hard-of-hearing actors.
"Right now, we're looking just to keep the theater alive," said Paul L. Winters, the group's executive director. "It's a national treasure that we would hate to lose."
In North Hollywood, Calif., the Deaf West Theater Company, which won critical acclaim for its adaptation of the Tony Award-winning musical "Big River," which went to Broadway in 2003, is having to make do without the $800,000 a year that Washington was sending its way. When the show toured Washington after playing on Broadway, the first lady, Laura Bush, included it in a special presidential gala last summer, where both she and the education secretary, Margaret Spellings, praised it generously.
"Somebody, somewhere, must have been looking for every penny they could, because it's not a lot of money," said Deaf West's managing director, Bill O'Brien, referring to the $2 million that Washington was doling out each year to qualified cultural programs for the deaf. Other community and educational organizations in or near New York, Chicago, Hartford, Seattle, San Francisco and Washington had also received five- and six-figure grants and are now feeling the pinch.
The money they lost was cut from the 2004 reauthorization bill for the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act, which had allowed the Office of Special Education Programs to award discretionary grants to organizations that provide cultural experiences that "enrich the lives of deaf and hard-of-hearing children and adults." That group, according to federal estimates, can range anywhere from a small fraction of 1 percent of the population up to about 3 percent, depending on the extent of the hearing loss; if everyone who reports any hearing difficulty is included, the estimates rise as high as 14 percent.
The Dec. 22, 2004, e-mail message that notified Dr. Winters of the impending change offered no rationale for it, but closed with a cheery "Holiday Greetings!"
Since then, he has been trying to keep his organization afloat. Not only did he put himself on furlough to cut his pay last year from $75,000 to $48,500, but he also takes his turn with the scrub brush every fifth week to clean toilets at the cottage his theater company leases for its headquarters from the American School for the Deaf in West Hartford.
Financial statements show he has cut costs to $560,000 in the fiscal year that ended on March 31, 2005, from the $1 million that was spent in fiscal 2004, his first year at the helm. Since then, he has furloughed staff members whenever schools were closed to rein in the payroll, and he forgives his deaf colleagues who refer to him in American Sign Language with the same slashing motion that denotes the word "ax."
Today, his company's slimmed-down theatrical offerings revolve mostly around the Little Theater of the Deaf, which stages children's shows that can be understood by the hearing and the hearing-impaired. At a recent performance at New City Elementary School in Rockland County, N.Y., students had prepared for the event by learning about American Sign Language; they practiced applauding by fluttering their fingers overhead. The show was called "Fingers Around the World — Next Stop: South of the Border," and the dialogue veered from spoken English and Spanish to American Sign Language and Mexican Sign Language. "Are you a talking cactus?" Naomi Ekperigin asked Christopher DeSouza, who took on extra parts in the show to save the cost of an additional cast member.
"I'm a signing cactus," he corrected her.
Sue Dello, a third-grade teacher at the school, expressed hope that Washington might restore the financing, adding that the play gave her students exposure to a world that "they don't get sitting in their nice homes in suburbia."
Because of the popularity of "Big River," Deaf West Theater has had some money to cushion the fall. Still, 60 percent of the $1.2 million in "revenue and support" that it reported in 2004 came from federal financing, according to its latest financial statements. "We are definitely starting to feel the pinch that the National Theater of the Deaf is feeling," Mr. O'Brien said. "I would bet that the person who struck through this priority had no idea what was being accomplished with that money. That deaf people were back on Broadway for the first time since 'Children of a Lesser God,' and that all of this was happening for those few dollars."
Patricia Scherer, founder of the International Center on Deafness and the Arts in Northbrook, Ill., credits her 32-year-old program with nurturing the aspirations of people like Marlee Matlin, a former drama student in her programs who went on to win an Academy Award for best actress in 1986. The $100,000 in federal grants that the center received in fiscal 2001, 2002 and again in 2003 for theatrical projects made up one-fifth of its total budget. Commenting on Congress's decision to cut programs for the deaf, she said she could only surmise that deaf people had suffered "because they can't scream loud enough" and could not swing elections.
Invited to a reception at the White House last June, on the day he was to perform the part of Mark Twain in a segment from "Big River," Mr. O'Brien took Secretary Spellings aside to make his well-rehearsed pitch. He said he let her know that the production would never have had the chance to go to Broadway or on tour without the $4 million over all that Deaf West had received from the very program that Washington was dismantling. "She told me to keep her posted," he said.
When asked recently whether Secretary Spellings planned to involve herself in this matter, her spokesman, Jim Bradshaw, said, "We defer to Congress's judgment on this one."
Center for Hearing and Balance at The New York Eye & Ear Infirmary Diagnoses Dizziness Often Linked to “Ear Rocks”
Physicians and therapists at The Center for Hearing and Balance at The New York Eye and Ear Infirmary know that the most common form of dizziness - Benign Paroxysmal Positional Vertigo - called BPPV, is caused by tiny calcium carbonate crystals (“ear rocks”) that break loose in the inner ear and lodge themselves in one of the ear’s semi-circular canals that function as balancing organs. People with BPPV might experience dizziness as they roll over when getting out of bed in the morning, or when they tilt their head back in the shower. The dizziness can trigger a fall or other accidents. The exact location of the disorienting crystals can be detected if patients wear special goggles that record rapid eye movements. A physician and physical therapist determine the location and can correct the problem through special turning movements of the head
We generally think of dizziness as affecting the elderly, but BPPV can affect people younger than age 50 who have bumped or fallen on their head, or have suffered a bad infection or side effects from medication. According to the National Institutes of Health, 40 percent of Americans will experience in their lifetime dizziness that is serious enough to warrant a doctor visit. “You do not have to live with dizziness, especially if it is caused by BPPV,” says Ronald A. Hoffman, MD, medical director of The Center for Hearing and Balance and co-director of The Beth Israel/New York Eye & Ear Cochlear Implant Center.
To determine if a patient has BPPV, The Infirmary uses special goggles that are hooked up to a computer and monitor. The patient lies down with the goggles on, and moves his or her head back and forth. The monitor shows an enlarged image of the patient’s eye so that physicians and therapists can detect if the patient is experiencing rapid eye movements, a sign of BPPV. “The direction and duration of the rapid eye movement tells us in which semicircular canal the calcium carbonate crystals, or rocks, are located,” says Dr. Hoffman. “Once we know the location, we treat the patient through a series of movements, gently turning the head.” says Linda Vetere, director of physical therapy for the Center. “The specific series of movements we use to reposition the crystal particles depend on which canal the crystal is in. We generally are able to remove them in one or two sessions.” While there are several types of treatment for BPPV, the most common is the Epley Method, in which the patient lies down for the procedure described above.
Not all dizziness is caused by BPPV, so a careful patient history is taken to determine if there is another, more serious medical cause, such as a heart problem or potential stroke. The Infirmary’s Center for Hearing and Balance is one of the most sophisticated of its type in the tri-state region, equipped with a comprehensive array of diagnostic and treatment services. Patients must be referred by a physician to the program. Advanced diagnostic technology at the Infirmary to determine the cause of dizziness, vertigo, balance problems and hearing problems includes: audiometric evaluations; computerized electronystagmography and video nystagmography (the sophisticated goggles); sinusoidal harmonic acceleration rotational chair testing, computerized dynamic platform posturography, electrocochleography; and brain stem response audiometry
For further information, contact The Center for Hearing and Balance at The New York Eye and Ear Infirmary, 230 Second Avenue, New York, NY 10003, 212-979-4340
