Volume 21 Issue 4

HOH-LD-News
Vol. 21, Issue 4
October 23, 2004

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Table of Contents
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- Article 1: ALDA San Diego Presentation: Protection & Advocacy
- Article 2: SHHH Convention: Disaster Preparedness Tips for Hard of Hearing People - Part 1
- Article 3: Long-Sought Key to Hearing May Be Found in Protein Discovery
- Article 4: ADA Game
- Classifieds
- Contact Information and Disclaimers

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Contact information and disclaimers are at the end of this newsletter.
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- Article 1: ALDA San Diego Presentation: Protection & Advocacy
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The San Diego ALDA group recently had the pleasure of a presentation by Val Vera, a Legal Advocate for Protection and Advocacy, Inc. (P&A). P&A is a national public interest, not-for-profit organization with four offices in California - Los Angeles, Oakland, Sacramento, and San Diego.

P&A is a federally mandated and funded program for persons with disabilities. They provide a variety of services including voting programs, mediation services, advocacy, complaint investigation, education, referrals, and outreach. Note that the state organizations may adopt different names. To contact the appropriate organization in your state, and for additional information on P&A, please visit their website at http://www.napas.org/.

The federal government requires a P&A organization in every state and provides about 80% of the organization's funding; the remaining 20% comes from the states and donations. The reliable funding streams allow P&A to provide their services to people with disabilities without charge.

The folks at P&A are happy to discuss individual situations, but there are restrictions on the cases they will take on. The first requirement is that the client must have a disability, and the situation in dispute must be disability-related. So a disabled client who is evicted for non-payment of rent would not be eligible for P&A representation, because the situation in question is not disability-related.

A second requirement for P&A involvement is that the client must have a valid case, i.e. there must be a legal requirement for the other party to do what you asked. For example a request for CART for a church service would not be a valid case, because the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) specifically exempts churches from the communications access requirements.

In determining which cases to accept, P&A also considers the ability of clients to advocate for themselves, and they must also consider the ability of their organization to accept additional commitments. With a paid staff of about 15 persons, and with responsibility for four southern California counties with a population of several million people, the San Diego office is stretched pretty thin.

Two of P&A's areas of focus are abuse and neglect (often in institutions) and anti-discrimination activities. This second category includes employment, housing, transportation, special education, and benefits (e.g., Social Security and Medicare issues).

Questions and Answers

Q. I was recently asked to serve on a jury. When I notified the court that I was hard of hearing and would require CART, they offered an interpreter. Despite my explanations that an interpreter would do no good because I don't know sign language, they refused to provide CART, so I wasn't able to perform jury duty. Is that a situation you could have helped with?
A. Yes, that's a pretty clear case. The courts have a legal responsibility to provide effective accommodations. In your case, that means CART.

Q. I had a friend who had laser surgery that caused her to become blind in one eye. She wasn't disabled before the surgery, but is now. Would P&A get involved in that situation?
A. Probably not, but not because of the timing of her becoming disabled. We don't get involved with medical malpractice, criminal cases, or family law.

Q. A friend of mine applied for SSDI. He has several disabilities. He has applied for job after job after job, and keeps getting turned down. I'm pretty sure it's because of his disabilities. But he was also turned down for SSDI! I couldn't believe it! Would you help him?
A. That's a sad situation, and not uncommon. But we don't get involved in SSDI eligibility. If you'd like to advocate for him, I'd suggest that you get the Social Security Green Book and find the wording that they use as SSDI justification for your friend's disabilities. Then have his doctor use those words or very similar ones in a letter of support.

Q. What is the statute of limitations for filing a discrimination complaint?
A. It depends on the law that was violated - various laws have various time periods. The shortest period I know of is one year, so if you file within a year, you should be safe.

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------- Eye on Washington --------------------------------
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Stay informed and protect your rights! The Eye on
Washington (EOW) is a national advocacy ezine published by
the National Association of the Deaf (NAD) that focuses on
activities occuring on Capitol Hill that affect deaf and
hard of hearing civil rights.

The EOW is open to all, members and non-members. It is
distributed once a month, sometimes more.
http://www.nad.org/ezine/ecommadmin.html
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- Article 2: SHHH Convention: Disaster Preparedness Tips for Hard of Hearing People - Part 1
By Cheryl Heppner
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Editor: Are you prepared for a disaster in your area? Have you thought about the special requirements for people with hearing loss? Here's Cheryl Heppner's report on Mary Clark's Disaster Preparedness Workshop from the Omaha SHHH Convention. This is Part one of two parts.

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Mary is a member of CERT (Community Emergency Response Team) for the City of Brea, California. She was previously a disaster services volunteer in Minnesota and has spent time in Miami during a hurricane watch. She works for a large biomedical manufacturer and is president of the Orange County chapter of SHHH. Mary participates in her employer's disaster team and has received specialty training.

Introduction

- Disasters are both natural and man-made. Natural disasters include such things as fire, flood, hurricane, tornado, earthquake; man-made disasters include such things as terrorism and plane crash. Both kinds of disaster are unexpected and unpredictable. They disrupt your access to basic things you need and they put your safety at risk.

- We must adopt an "I'm prepared" attitude. Fear is our biggest enemy and we can protect ourselves, our families and our property by taking control if we are prepared. The top five things you will need in a disaster are water, food, light, communications and special needs. You should store as many as you can in an emergency kit and keep the rest in a location where you can find them fast if you need to exit your home in a hurry.

WATER
- Plan to store bottled water for drinking -- 1 gallon per person per day for 3 days. (Three days gives some time for electricity to be restored, rioting and looting to be under control, roads to be repaired, etc.)
- During an emergency, if you suspect the water is unsafe, add 3 drops of bleach or iodine per quart. Mary noted that a Big Gulp cup is 44 oz. and a quart is 32 oz. Use this water for washing. If you need to drink it, add something like Tang, Crystal Lite, or Kool-Aid to mask the flavor.
- You can also use water from your water heater or swimming pool.
- Remember that you need this water at both work and home.

FOOD
- Under stress you will need food to keep your energy up. Store enough for 3 days.
- Get high protein choices but not necessarily sugar. Protein bars, canned tuna (if you have a can opener). Those little square boxes of food that kids like are easy to store and canned fruit is also good.
- Watch food expiration dates. One woman in the audience goes through her emergency kit each year when the Post Office has its annual food drive. She gives away any food that is not outdated and replaces it. Mary said that it's also a good idea to replace old bandages and band-aids. Diapers, bandanas, dishtowels and pads can also be used as emergency bandages.

POWER
- Speechreaders will need flashlights with lots of batteries. You can buy big packages cheaply at Costco and Sam's Club. You can also use light sticks; stock them up at Halloween when they are cheap. They last anywhere from 3-12 hours. You can extend the shelf life by keeping them in the freezer. There are also crank flashlights that don't need batteries.
- Camping lanterns are also helpful, but may need matches. Matches and candles are not recommended unless you can be sure there is no gas leak. Some backpacking lanterns fold up to be small and the sides shield the flame.

***************
(c)2004 by Northern Virginia Resource Center for Deaf and Hard of Hearing Persons (NVRC), www.nvrc.org. When sharing this information, please ensure credit is given to NVRC.

--------------- Captioned Movie Directory ---------------
Want to know what captioned movies are
playing in your area? If you live in southern California,
Denver, Chicago, Washington DC, Portland OR,
or Victoria or Vancouver, BC
point your browser to:
http://www.hearinglossweb.com/res/lcl/lcl.htm
and click on your city!
Updated Weekly!
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- Article 3: Long-Sought Key to Hearing May Be Found in Protein Discovery
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Editor: We're getting closer and closer to understanding how sound vibrations cause an electrical signal to be sent over the auditory nerve. The folks at Harvard Medical recently reported a major discovery. Here's their press release.

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BOSTON, Oct. 13 (AScribe Newswire) -- Researchers at Harvard Medical School and their colleagues report in the Oct. 13 Nature advanced online edition that they have identified a protein deep in the inner ear that they believe translates sound into the nerve impulses used by the brain. "People have been looking for this protein for a decade," says David Corey, HMS professor of neurobiology and an investigator of the Howard Hughes Medical Institute. Other protein candidates have been nominated, but this is "the strongest evidence yet that this protein is the hair-cell transduction channel," says Corey, lead author of the paper.

The discovery could help scientists investigate normal hearing and inherited forms of deafness, which typically involve other protein pieces of the same acoustic apparatus, says Corey, also co-director of the HMS Center for Hereditary Deafness.

"This is the most important molecule in the ear," said Peter Gillespie, a neurobiologist at Oregon Health & Science University who recently has helped identify important parts connecting to either side of the channel. "This channel is the jewel everyone would like to find. Identifying it is getting at the real kernel of how the inner ear works."

The protein, TRPA1 (pronounced TRIP-AY-ONE), is located at the tips of specialized cilia on hair cells of the inner ear. Scientists believe the protein forms pores that open and close in sync with sound waves, allowing ions to flow into the cells and to transform the vibrations into electric signals. The same protein channel also may help people distinguish between tones of different frequencies.

Sound travels through the auditory system like a message relayed through the jungle from drum to drum. Snippets of conversation or the roar of a leaf blower are collected by the fleshy outer part of the ear and funneled inside where a delicate percussion section vibrates, taps and shivers.

The key elements in converting sound into nerve impulses are the bundles of cilia that protrude from the tops of hair cells and give them their name. Inside the cochlea, the stiff cilia bend at their bases when the pulsing sound waves push against them thousands of times a second. Small protein strings called tip links connect the tip of each cilium with its taller neighbor. (Six months ago, other researchers discovered the molecular identity of the tip links.) With each vibration, the bending cilia pull on the links connecting them, yanking open the channels to allow ions to flood into the cilia. The resulting voltage change activates the conversion of sound to a nerve signal. Then, the cilia bend back and ion channels snap shut.

"Hair cells convert a mechanical stimulus into an electrical signal with molecular, strings, springs and levers," Corey says. "It's cell biology, but it's wonderfully mechanical as well."

In their paper, Corey and his colleagues present evidence that the mysterious ion channel is actually TRPA1. The TRP proteins are a trendy new family of ion channels involved in sensory perception. Different TRP proteins help insects see and hear, mammals taste and sense heat and pheromones. A small clan known as TRPN help fruit flies sense touch and fish hear.

At the beginning of their study, Corey and his colleagues systematically evaluated all of the several dozen mouse TRP channels with RNA probes to locate the ones expressed by hair cells of the mouse cochlea. TRPA1 looked most promising. Using antibodies to TRPA1, the team found that the channels were located at the tips of hair cell cilia.

As attractive as the protein appeared, it had to pass several other rigorous tests made possible by scientific advances in the last several years. In zebrafish, the researchers blocked expression of the TRPA1 protein and found their hair cells did not generate electrical signals in response to vibration. In a related test, these hair cells showed none of the telltale glow when exposed to a fluorescent dye that usually pours in through working transduction ion channels.

In the third set of experiments, collaborators at the University of Virginia School of Medicine genetically blocked the TRPA1 channel in hair cells of embryonic mice, using siRNAs carried in with adenoviruses, and measured the response. They recorded barely any electrical activity in the hair cells with blocked TRPA1. Likewise, the hair cells did not take up the fluorescent dye. Although the discovery needs confirmation by other methods, TRPA1 is the best candidate for the hair-cell transduction channel.

What are the implications for hearing and deafness? "Other protein components of the transduction apparatus cause inherited deafness and blindness when mutated," Corey says. "Although there is no evidence for it at the moment, the same may be true for TRPA1. Having the transduction channel will accelerate a search for the remaining protein pieces, and these in turn may be causes of inherited deafness."

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- Article 4: ADA Game
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Are you interested in playing a great game and learning about the ADA at the same time? Or perhaps you'd like to try out your advocacy skills in a simulated environment before plunging into the real world. Here's a great online game that allows you to do these things and more. It's free and available to all at http://www.adagame.org

Here's the game description from the website:

The ADA Game simulates how advocacy can promote positive changes in communities. Players take on the role of advocates for disability rights in one of eight virtual communities in the Southeastern United States and work together to improve compliance with the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) in their communities in the areas of: Program Access, Public Accommodations, Transportation, Employment, and Communication.

Thanks to bhNEWS for the lead on this site!

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- Classifieds
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Graduate Studies in Psychology
Gallaudet University
Washington, DC
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Interested in pursuing graduate studies in psychology?

The Department of Psychology at Gallaudet University offers both an APA accredited Ph.D. program in Clinical Psychology, and a NASP/NCATE accredited Specialist degree program in School Psychology, both of which include specialized training for work with Deaf and Hard of Hearing clients and their families.

The Ph.D. program requires four years of coursework plus a one year full-time internship.

The School Psychology program requires two years of course work and a full-time, academic year internship.

Limited financial support is available.

Applicants should possess a bachelor's degree in psychology, or be in the process of completing their bachelor's degree, and have either a psychology major or substantial course work in psychology. Relevant work experience is desired, though not required.

Deaf and hearing applications are encouraged. For more information, contact Patrick J. Brice, Ph.D., Clinical Program Director (patrick.brice@gallaudet.edu), or Lynne Blennerhassett, Ed.D., School Psychology Program Director (lynne.blennerhassett@gallaudet.edu).

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- Contact Information and Disclaimers
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