hardofhearingchildren.com by PAM Candlish MLS
"What did you say?" "Eh?" "WHAT did you say?" "MM?" "WHAT DID YOU SAY?" oh "PARDON ME!"

Through the Cracks

Children who Fall Through the Cracks

A favorite descriptor of children with mild hearing losses is "children who fall through the cracks." It would be more appropriate to call it the Grand Canyon of Neglect.  1 in 9 children have a mild hearing loss.1 in 1500 has a profound loss.
Children with mild hearing losses were presumed to be able to cope, nobody thought there was a problem.
Challenge of hearing aids was to reach the very deaf first.  Technology was primitive and the task seemed daunting.

How did the Cracks get There?

Research focused on deaf children to remove variables.
Problems of mild and moderate hearing losses were minimized by other parents, teachers, audiologists, teachers of the deaf, the list is long. How many times have I heard from another parent (who is getting services) "Well, your child is not DEAF like mine."

In a phone conference with several people in the Ontario Ministry of Education in which I was representing the rights of any child who cannot hear perfectly to have support: that Voice for Hearing Impaired Children had stated to them that it was realistic to provide services to children with thresholds of 50 dB; that my personal recommendation was worthless because I did not officially represent a group. No one from Voice has ever had the guts to say they were the group making this recommendation. At the 2000 Voice conference in Kitchener, 95% of the parents were thinking about getting cochlear implants in the next year. This means 95% of the audience was concerned only with rights and privileges of total deafness. I find there are many organizations who have added hard of hearing to their name and purpose, but are doing little or nothing for hard of hearing children. 

Hearing aid companies made big promises that hearing aids make it better, which implies a cure.
Most children with mild hearing losses were treated by the doctor and never saw an audiologist.

Impact of Cochlear Implants on Hard of Hearing Children

Now that the very deaf children are getting cochlear implants, their aided thresholds take them to better hearing than many hard of hearing children. Based on the aided audiogram, technically they are no longer entitled to the support the schools would give them before the implants. 
So, all of a sudden hard of hearing children have needs.

How Many Kids at School Can hear the Teacher.

Most classrooms are acoustic nightmares. Soundfield amplification works for everyone, improves the sound quality, and lessens the strain on the teacher's throat.

The child does not know when the child does not hear. Many teachers do not understand the complexities of hearing loss. Teachers must learn more about all the special complications in the human being which impede learning.

High cost High tech Solutions

The children who have greater hearing thresholds often have "high"tech parents focused on solving the problems. These parents understand the frequencies of speech, the earshot, the maintenance of audiological perfection in the child's ears.  The children with mild or moderate losses often have parents who, unfortunately believe that $5000 on hearing aids and hopefully a FM every three years will fix the hearing problem. In the process of defining and prescribing hearing aids, that is what they are told, to get them to pay for the hearing aids.

It is the basic principle of auditory/verbal philosophy that the child have the best hearing aids available in the child's ears. The difference between a basic hearing aid, and a programmable analog hearing aid made by the same company is so great that my son refuses to wear the basic hearing aid because the sound is so inferior. This leads to a terrible situation if a child who has a mild loss, and "cheap" or "broke" parents who select a basic hearing aid.

 If anyone is going to have to cope with a basic hearing aid, it should be the people with greater hearing losses because they do not hear the background noises which drive people who have mild and moderate hearing losses up the wall.

More Focus on Hard of Hearing Needs

There is less focus in research on deaf people by the hearing aid companies. After a certain point, the deafness is expected to be remedied by a cochlear implant. This is a benefit for the rest of the population. 

Cohesive Action from Everyone is needed.

I will know that we have accomplished something when I am offered compassion and support in a court of law.  And when parents of a hard of hearing child get to park next to the shopping centre in handicapped parking, instead of tying the kid up with a dog leash to get him or her into the store.