In search of courage. Well, that is how it all started. I was fairly advanced in surgical training not to mention age, when I decided to join the Territorial Army (TA). My peers, on hearing this couldn’t decide whether I...
Introduction Profound childhood hearing loss has a huge impact on early communication skills, the acquisition of spoken language, and hence on educational attainments and employment prospects. Over the centuries, educators of the deaf attempted to overcome the challenge by using...
Education and training have a key part to play in the development of leaders of the future; Dorte Hammershøi discusses the educational approaches taken in Denmark and the pros and cons of the methods used. Dorte also explains the BEAR...
Professor Bill Gibson is one of the great pioneers of inner ear surgery and the recent publication of his biography is a reflection of his remarkable life and career. Bill Gibson: Pioneering Bionic Ear Surgeon will be enjoyed by everyone...
As a Macmillan Head and Neck Specialist Nurse, I was very pleased to be asked to review this book, The Laryngectomee Guide, by Itzhak Brook, MD. It is fair to say that for most laryngectomy patients, life does go on...
The field of psychoacoustics and the practice of audiology have always been curious bedfellows. In the clinic, we commonly assess patients’ hearing ability through pure-tone detection, a classic psychoacoustical phenomenon, but just one of the many, many ways in which...
The fifth edition of Charles E Speaks’ Introduction to Sound Acoustics for the Hearing and Speech Sciences is a comprehensive, teaching-first textbook spanning 11 chapters. It begins with the nature of soundwaves presented in concise, well-structured sections on transmitting mediums,...
Optical cochlear implants combine optogenetics and light-based hardware to overcome limits of electrical CIs, promising sharper frequency resolution and more natural hearing. Cochlear implants (CIs) are among the most successful neuroprosthetic devices in modern medicine, restoring speech perception to hundreds...
Brigadier Robin Garnett gives us a snapshot of the 2014 Royal British Legion report on hearing problems of Service personnel and veterans. The difficulties in assessing and managing hearing loss are reiterated in this article, with an introduction to how...
21st January 2021 Back to basics Yesterday I went right back to where my medical career began. I grew up in Germany, bilingual. A prerequisite to studying medicine in Germany is that applicants have to spend two months working as...
Ever find yourself in a noisy restaurant, barely following conversation yet nodding in clueless agreement? Considering how loud social settings can be, this is likely a familiar scenario. As gatherings become a regular part of our lives again, so do...
Having just read about the challenges cochlear implant technology and music appreciation present, the musician Richard Reed beautifully illustrates the realities of this patient journey. An old friend of mine is an ardent music fan, and completely tone deaf. Long...