President-elect Catherine Palmer’s General Assembly Speech #AAAConf19

We do not do hearing and balance tests.

We do not sell devices.

We…

Change the course of cognitive decline for patients

Reduce the risk of patients falling

Start a chain of events for a child that will promote reading, education, and employment

Prevent social isolation

In fact, we ensure social participation which increases life expectancy.

We,

Decrease depression

Decrease medical adverse events

Decrease hospitalization and readmissions

And we can save the health care system over 3.3 billion dollars per year

You may do this directly or you may be the educator of the next generation of audiologists. You may be the researcher who develops better ways to impact health and education.  Whatever your role, it is critical to the patients we serve and the profession who serves them.

We often talk about how important it is that others recognize what we do and it is.  It is just as important that we recognize what we do and use language that reflects our place in the health care value chain.

There has never been a better time to be an audiologist.  We are experts in communication which is essential to the human condition.  We are experts in balance which is critical to basic human survival.  

It’s not about hearing, it’s about communication, brain health, and healthy aging. The ear is the doorway to the brain.

It’s not about dizziness or balance, it’s about wellness, navigating your environment, and aging in place.

We do not do hearing and balance tests.  We do not sell devices.

Why do we need to embrace this language? Why do we need to pay attention to our words?

Because the future is going to look different and we need to position ourselves to play an essential role in wellness and improved health outcomes.  Our role will be as experts in communication and balance.  The people who can use test results to create treatment plans customized for individuals who present with unique abilities, needs, and challenges.  Professionals who function as a critical part of a health care or educational team who bring value to the individual and society by virtue of our training, knowledge, and skill set.

In the future, there will be hearing and balance tests and most likely they will be wildly advanced from what we know now.  And there will be devices, more advanced than we can imagine.  But none of these will define us, our unique contribution to our patients will be our ability to improve quality of life in a cost-effective manner using all of the unique, emerging tools in our armamentarium.  

Imagine that you are the health care team member who uses recent advances in auditory neuroscience to assess an individual’s brain’s response to sound.  You are in charge of creating a treatment plan that will include auditory training to reverse deprivation effects caused by untreated hearing loss.  You create a personalized care plan that is monitored through advanced assessment of plasticity changes that signal recovery of processing function which ultimately allows the patient to make the best use of the technology you recommend.

What will it take to create this future?  One, recognizing and embracing our place in the health care value chain.  Two, collaboration between the people in this room – academics who produce new knowledge, industry partners who create the tools to act on this knowledge, and audiologists who put this knowledge into action to impact lives.  Three, collaboration with other health care professionals.  We need to manage the assessment and treatment of hearing and balance problems when they are not the primary health concern but left untreated will negatively impact health outcomes.

I encourage you to use the educational sessions and exhibit hall at this convention to hone your current knowledge and skill set with an eye to the future.  I challenge you to use language that reflects what you do – ask an exhibitor how their new product will improve your patient’s quality of life. Ask a presenter how their data will impact your patient’s ability to be the best version of themselves.

Catherine Palmer, PhD, President-elect, American Academy of Audiology