CEU Courses

Each year, over 300 articles are published in professional journals related to the function and fitting of hearing aids. Some are rather esoteric, but others have data that provide unique fitting tips that can be applied on Monday morning! We'll review the key findings of some of this emerging research that hopefully will be useful to you and beneficial for your patients.

From optimizing technologies given the invariable tradeoffs present in many technologies and differences in listener’s abilities and important listening situations; to individualizing services based on patients’ needs and desires; we have long known we can do better. Recently however, a variety of “change factors” have increased professionals desire and ability to personalize care. In this presentation some of these change factors will be briefly reviewed. Some recent data exploring the effects and new questions around these change factors and the potential for new service delivery models will be discussed.

Restaurant dining experiences are among the most importance places where we communicate, yet they are immensely difficult places for older adults to communicate effectively. This interview with Dr. Rachael Piper will review her capstone study that examines self-perceived difficulties, willingness to pay, willingness to stay and speech intelligibility data as a function of hearing loss in older adults. Advantages and limitations of hearing aid technology and how to squeeze the most benefit from hearing aids in noise will be part of the conversation. While listening to this podcast, it is helpful to follow along with Figures 2 and 3 of the attached study.

The relationship between hearing loss, hearing aids, and cognitive impairment has been the subject of much discussion over the past decade or so. In this session, we will explore the literature surrounding hearing aids and cognitive impairment and apply it to clinical practice.

Watching television or movies at home is a very common leisure activity for adults. Yet, people with hearing loss often struggle to hear the television. This presentation will discuss the importance of television or movie viewing and will offer some evidence-based solutions for improving the television viewing experience for adults with hearing loss.

Most clinicians recognize the importance of empowerment in the patient journey, but do they know what it really means for a patient to feel empowered? Find out in this engaging and informative podcast with WSA research scientist, Sarah Gotowiec, PhD, who reviews the five dimensions of patient empowerment and how clinicians can apply her research to empower patients more effectively throughout the patient journey. This recent open access article is the focus of her discussion: https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/14992027.2021.1915509

Health literacy is a critical aspect of patient centered care, but it often flies under the radar of many hearing care professionals. In this podcast, Barbara Weinstein, esteemed professor at the City University of New York, sits down with Brian Taylor to discuss the multidimensional aspects of health literacy and how hearing care professionals can improve the patient activation process by applying various health literacy principles.

There have been numerous studies recently that link untreated hearing loss and fall risk. This webinar will discuss the possible underlying mechanism(s) and the impact of treating hearing loss on decreasing fall risk.

The ability of audiologists to visit social media sites such as Facebook’s Audiology Happy Hour to “crowd source” clinical opinions are popular, but there are several significant drawbacks. A preferred approach to tapping into the hive mind is using evidence-based practice (EBP) principles. This podcast reviews basic EBP principles, the value of the systematic meta-analysis and how they improve the clinical decision-making process and ultimately patient outcomes.

The Augmented Xperience (AX) platform with Augmented Focus separates the target speech signal from the surrounding signals at the input stage, then processes the two signals separately in two different processors. The separate processing creates a clear acoustic contrast between the focus area and the surrounding area and results in clearer speech and ambient noise that is not intrusive. This webinar will discuss expansions to the AX portfolio, with more form factors to match the individual needs of the wearer.