Volume 25 Issue 2

HOH-LD-News
Vol. 25, Issue 2
October 8, 2005

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Table of Contents
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- Article 1: Sign Language as a Job Requirement - Reader Response

- Article 2: The Origins of Regenerated Hair Cells - Part 2

- Article 3: Affordable Hearing Aids for Folks of Modest Means

- Article 4: Cell phones, iPods ... hearing aids

Our advertisers make it possible for us to provide HOH-LD-News as a free service. Please let them know you appreciate their support, and please mention that you saw their message in HOH-LD-News.

- Advertisers in this Issue
First Premium Placement: Special Limited Time Offer at Harris Communications
Second Premium Placement: San Diego Meeting on Cochlear Implants
Third Premium Placement: IHHD Online Educational Opportunities
Classified Section: One Workshop, one Senior Living Availability, and one Retreat

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Contact information and disclaimers are at the end of this newsletter.
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Special Limited Time Offer at Harris Communications
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Harris Communications is offering a 10% discount on books, novelties, DVDs, and videos. Plus, we have FREE shipping on orders of $50 or more*. Choose from a wide selection of titles with many new products available. Hurry, this offer expires October 16th.

*Free shipping only available for UPS ground shipments within the Continental US.

For more information go to http://www.harriscomm.com/link/?www.harriscomm.com?sr=hlw or contact us at mailto:info@harriscomm.com

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- Article 1: Sign Language as a Job Requirement - Reader Response
by Mitch Turbin
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Editor: I was a bit surprised to get only a couple of responses to last week's article entitled "Sign Language as a Job Requirement to Work with DeafAndHardOfHearing". Both of them were positive. There was also some discussion of the article on a few of the hearing loss lists, where the response was more mixed (though the majority of responders in agreement with my position, I believe.)

One of the comments I got was from Mitch Turbin, who teachers graduate classes in Rehabilitation Counseling for the Deaf and Hard of Hearing at Western Oregon University. Here are his remarks.

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I sometimes fight the same battle that Larry poses here - saying that if we demand ASL for all workers we are discriminating against those job applicants who are hard of hearing or late deafened. But my response is now often to say that if we insist that all counselors/social workers, etc. have ASL skills, then it would make sense to insist that all counselors etc. also have good WRITTEN English skills. It is at this point that I draw the line and refuse to give ground. For an OHL or hearing person to know ASL they need to acquire a skill; granted it's a difficult skill but one that specialists in working with people with hearing loss can be reasonably expected to learn for at least some job settings. For a Deaf person to be able to speak, they need to NOT have their disability, rather than just learn a skill; so there's the difference. (OK-there are a few exceptions, people born deaf or who become deaf early in life, and yet learn to speak well, but those are exceptions, and we shouldn't require such unusual skill in all Deaf people. History has shown that this is indeed an injustice.)

Requiring that all workers be able to use written English fluently is where some justice MUST happen, in my opinion. If that Deaf person has worked hard and become truly skilled and fluent in written English, they are often quite open to "listening" to the issues of OHL clients and addressing their specific needs. Indeed, in my graduate classes in Rehabilitation Counseling for the Deaf and Hard of Hearing at Western Oregon University, I have sometimes been surprised and delighted at the openness and perceptiveness of my Deaf students in regard to the OHL issues I teach - and almost always, those are the Deaf students who turn in really good WRITTEN papers, in clear, lucid English. Alas, it is true that there are service providers, both Deaf and hearing, who are quite bi-lingual but still engage in a discriminatory refusal to address OHL people and our real issues. It is easier, however, for me to advocate for equal treatment of OHL and Deaf people when I am also known to advocate for both of those native languages, ASL and English.

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San Diego Meeting on Cochlear Implants
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ALDA-San Diego and Hearing Loss Network are pleased to announce a presentation by Curtis Humphries of Cochlear Corporation at our October meeting. Curtis will discuss the new Freedom CI beginning at 10 AM on Saturday, October 15, 2005.

For additional information, including meeting location and directions, please point your browser to http://www.hearinglossnetwork.org/serv/mtgs/alda/alda.htm or email larry@hearinglossnetwork.org

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- Article 2: The Origins of Regenerated Hair Cells - Part 2
by Cheryl Heppner
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Editor: The 2005 SHHH Convention's 12th Annual Research Symposium was on the Origins of Regenerated Hair Cells. Those who are following this research know that scientists are making substantial progress towards the day when they'll be able to regrow hair cells in humans; they also know that day is stills a ways off.

Here's Cheryl's report on this very interesting symposium. If you'd like to share this article, please be sure to credit NVRC. (See credit at the end of the article.)

This is Part 2 of 2 parts.

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Applications for Stem Cells in Restoring Hearing Loss
Dr. Stefan Heller
Massachusetts Eye and Ear Infirmary
Harvard Medical School

- You don't hear with the hair cells, you hear with the brain. For that reason it would be much better to have a biological cure than a cochlear implant.

- Loss of hearing comes in two phases when you age. First the number of outer cells, which make the vibration in your ear, gets smaller. You can still hear, but you need higher sound levels and stimulation. Next the inner cells are affected. Those are more complicated. When you lose those, you can't hear at all. But you can still use a cochlear implant to stimulate the auditory nerve.

- The possible treatments for regeneration are:
1. Drugs, but these are very labor-intensive and use a lot of animals
2. Viral, introducing Atoh1 with gene therapy, but this is far away from any clinical application at the moment
3. Stem cell, grafting progenitor cells with human cells to speed things up

- Is it possible to regenerate hair cells from stem cells? There are two populations of stem cells you can use -- embryonic and adult. The embryonic cells grow on top of others.

- Some mouse cells were taken and transplanted to the ear in the cochlea of a chicken embryo. From this experiment, it was learned that it's possible to generate from embryonic stem cells a population of progenitor cells to transplant in an embryonic cochlea.

- Now attempts are needed to try in utero stem cell therapy, injecting stem cells. There are many roadblocks ahead and many more steps before the science is ready for this to be done in humans.

- Drug screening for compounds that induce hearing cell regeneration in a test tube are another approach. Researchers would like to use human embryonic cells, but will have to adapt all they have learned from mouse cells.

- Are there possible alternatives for embryonic stem cells? Adult stem cells from the nervous system ("neural stem cells") didn't work well. Others have been tried -- bone marrow, skin, etc.

- Can we find inner ear stem cells? Research found that there are stem cells in the balance epithelia and cochlea. But the research also discovered that there is variation in different areas. In the Organ of Corti, cells seemed to die out fast. Vestibular system cells remained much longer.

- The stem cells could be maintained in a lab, but it was a long and arduous process to build, maintain and increase them. Expansion and long-term storage isn't optional.

- Stem cells have been isolated from the ear. In the past year, they've gone from isolating 15 cells from one to 250 cells.

- Cultures can be done of human adult hair cells so they won't have to do human testing. This looks promising.

- Embryonic, inner ear and other stem cells all need cell delivery into the inner ear, and safety studies must be addressed.

- Spiral ganglion cells (neurons) have an important role. If you have these cells, you can hear with a cochlear implant. If you don't, you cannot hear with a cochlear implant. These cells get signals from the hair cells to the brain. In auditory neuropathy, the hair cells work but people can't hear, and this is most likely due to the absence of spiral ganglion cells.

- It is more complicated to replace hair cells, but replacing neurons should be easier. Neural progenitors were grafted into a de-afferented gerbil cochlea. This wasn't expected to work so well as it did. It's now being studied in a second and third batch of animals.

- Inner ear cell regeneration therapy has been and will continue to be a long road.

- Both gene therapy and progenitor cell transplanting are in very early experimental stages.

- Stem cell-based approaches have no alternative for human embryonic stem cells. They are the only appropriate cell group.

- There are different flavors of hair cells. Not only are there inner and outer ear cells, but the ear has certain frequencies.

- If gene therapy is used to regenerate cells, it would not pass to offspring.

- Japanese researchers are testing with grafting stem cells at different locations to see where they show up.

- Researchers have used every growth factor they could get their hands on to try to restimulate hair cells. This is probably best. No drug has been discovered, but a gene has.

- Dr. Heller is concerned not just about continued funding but also about continually attracting people to the field.

Q: Drugs are being used to stimulate cell growth; have you thought about nutrition?
A: Yes, that is done all the time. A very nutritious growing medium is used.

Q: Where is most of the research being done?
A: About 3/4 of the inner ear regeneration is being done in the US. A couple of groups are also working in Europe. Luckily there is a good exchange and collaboration among researchers, not a group that is nasty to each other.

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(c)2005 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.

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You're Career Oriented... Career Driven...and Hard of Hearing or Deaf
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The Institute for Persons Who Are Hard of Hearing or Deaf (IHHD) is a nonprofit Congressionally-funded agency dedicated to facilitating workplace and career advancement for aspiring professionals like you.

IHHD provides important online educational opportunities to share experiences, access top professional leaders, and develop crucial communication and business skills. Choose from a number of programs that cover all aspects of career growth - from starting a business to leadership and advocacy development.

These month-long courses are delivered online using National University's acclaimed state-of-the-art interactive learning system to provide optimal accessibility. Visit: http://cha.nu.edu/ec/formihhd-careerdev.html?ypd002
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- Article 3: Affordable Hearing Aids for Folks of Modest Means
By Stephen O. Frazier, VP of Albuquerque SHHH
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Editor: Hearing aids are expensive! There's no getting around it. With growing concern that a lot of folks are just flat unable to afford hearing aids, some measures are in the works, including efforts to secure a tax credit for hearing aid purchases and efforts to require health insurance policies to cover hearing aids. An organization called Audient Alliance is doing something NOW. Here's Steve Frazier with the story.

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One of the major reasons given by Hard of Hearing individuals for not purchasing hearing aids is their cost. During his visit to Albuquerque last February, Terry Portis, Executive Director of the national Self Help for Hard of Hearing People (SHHH) organization, told members of the local chapter that the average cost for a pair of hearing aids today is $3,400, a figure that puts them out of reach for many - especially seniors. $1,700 per hearing aid secures a medium quality, fully digital hearing aid but there are less sophisticated models available for about half of that - still making a pair cost up to $2000 when incidental costs are included.

A spokesperson for the local SHHH chapter says that one of the most frequent complaints voiced by people who contact the group is the high cost of hearing instruments and the most frequent question is, "Where can I get affordable hearing aids?" To address this problem, the national SHHH organization has joined in promoting a new program entitled AUDIENT, an alliance for accessible hearing care for low income populations who are challenged by the cost of hearing care.

Central to this program is the availability of high quality digital hearing aids at a cost that makes them affordable to those who otherwise might not have adequate financial resources. The alliance, formed by the Northwest Lion's Foundation for Sight and Hearing, includes hearing healthcare providers, hearing instrument manufacturers and leading institutions across the country who want to serve SHHH members and others who are unable to pay for the hearing care they or their families need.

To qualify for this plan, an applicant's annual income must not exceed $23,500 for a single adult or $31,225 for a family of two. Applicants are screened by AUDIENT to determine income qualification and then referred to a participating local hearing care professional for a hearing test, ear molds and the dispensing of the instruments. Those applicants who meet the income requirements can get good quality digital hearing aids including fitting, adjustments and ear molds for either $599 or $625 for a single hearing aid, or $988 or $1040 for a pair. The difference of cost depends on the patient's hearing needs.

These fees include the cost of fitting patients through AUDIENT providers. The fees are the same from all providers and include fitting and orientation, ear molds, up to three aural rehabilitation follow up visits, and administration of an outcome measure questionnaire, from which AUDIENT will collect outcomes data. The diagnostic evaluation is charged separately.

To apply for care now, or to learn more about the program, AUDIENT can be contacted directly at 1(877) 283-4367. Interested parties can also visit the AUDIENT website: http://www.audientalliance.org/index.htm or contact a program services representative by email at: info@audientalliance.org

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- Article 4: Cell phones, iPods ... hearing aids
by Ana Veciana-Suarez
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Editor: Young people listen to music for too long and at too high a volume, and the result is a dramatic increase in noise-induced hearing loss. The trend is getting worse and will have some surprising affects. Here's part of a recent article on this topic by Ana Veciana-Suarez. For the complete article please point your browser to www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/living/columnists/ana_veciana_suarez/12660015.htm

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Beg your pardon?

What did you say?

Could you repeat that?

A little louder please.

Huh?

These phrases may very well become the cool mule talk of the future -- a future in which many of us will likely be wearing hearing aids.

Hearing aids, by the way, will also make a fashion statement of sorts. They will be sold in a dizzying variety of colors, designer brand and generic, endorsed by all manner of luminaries. Mark my words: hearing aids may be as ubiquitous to the 40-somethings of the future as braces are to today's adolescents.

Scary, yes, but not improbable.

See, we're slowly surrendering our hearing to the cacophony of the modern world.

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- Classifieds
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One Workshop, one Senior Living Availability, and one Retreat appear in this issue. (Ads appear after this brief table of contents.)

Stop Bullying and Victimization in Your School
Workshops Offered
Dr. Patricia S. Hodgdon
Frederick, MD

Water Tower View Senior Housing Applications Available
Greenfield, Wisconsin

JDSR Retreat
Rochester, NY (NTID)
December 2 - 4, 2005

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Stop Bullying and Victimization in Your School
Workshops Offered
Dr. Patricia S. Hodgdon
Frederick, MD
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Need Help With Bullying And Victimization In Your School?

- Do your students hit, kick, and shove each other?
- Do your students use name calling as a form of intimidation?
- Do you know how to stop a bully?
- Are you frustrated about what to do?

- Workshops offered

Patricia S. Hodgdon, Ph.D., is a consultant specializing in bullying and victimization. She provides consultation to teachers, parents, deaf and hard of hearing students in Public Schools and Residential Schools for the Deaf all over the country. Her consultation efforts are based on increasing faculty and staff awareness of bullying and victimization; helping school staff recognize and evaluate the amount of bullying, pecking order, and relational aggression in their schools.

She is a certified school psychologist.

E-mail Dr. Hodgdon for additional information at:
mailto:PSHodgdon@aol.com

Dr. Patricia S. Hodgdon
P.O. Box 11
Frederick, MD, 21705

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Water Tower View Senior Housing Applications Available
Greenfield, Wisconsin
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Water Tower View senior housing for the Deaf, Hard of Hearing and Deaf-Blind is welcoming applications. This senior housing has been designed with a variety of amenities and is sponsored and supported by the Southeastern Wisconsin Deaf Senior Citizens, Inc. Cardinal Capital Management, Inc. is the developer.

Applicants for this affordable housing must meet certain qualifications, specifically:

- At least one member of the household must be a minimum of 55 years of age
- The household income must not exceed the limit set by the IRS Section 42 tax credit program
- The household must be able to show a good credit rating

Location:
3983 S. Prairie Hill Lane,
Greenfield, Wisconsin
(87th & Howard Avenue in Woodland Ridge)

For more information, and to order an application, please contact:
- Katie Voss at mailto:kvoss@cardinalcapital.us or call VP/TTY 888-532-4135, or
- Carol Comp at ccomp@cardinalcapital.us or call VP/TTY 888-532-4107

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JDSR Retreat
Rochester, NY (NTID)
December 2 - 4, 2005
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First time Wolk Hillel (NTID) co-sponsoring with JDSR:
Fifth Annual Retreat on Campus!

Early Bird special has been extended to October 17th (postmarked/contacted)!

No registration at door

Where: NTID, Rochester, New York

When: December 2-4, 2005 (start at night on December 1st, will have bus from NY/NJ)

For Whom: Jewish deaf and hard of hearing singles including widowed and divorced worldwide, in any level of Judaism and way of communication.

- FUN outings
- INFORMATIVE workshops
- STIMULATING activities

Meals are provided.

Hotel room reservation required before November 3, 2005
(within five minute walk to the campus, free shuttle to the airport)
Donations welcome.
Limited scholarships are available.

For more information and registration,
email: Landau9@optonline.net
fax at 908 352 7395
write to:
JDSR
PO Box 2005,
NY, NY 10159-2005

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- Contact Information and Disclaimers
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