HLAA Convention 2010 Special: Workshops # 4

[Guest guest]

NVRC News - July 9, 2010

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Making Your Home Accessible and Safe

By Bonnie O'Leary

This workshop was presented by NVRC's dear friend and go-to expert, Joe

Duarte, President/Co. Principal of Duartek, Inc., in Fairfax, VA. Joe

shared with us some details about his life. He is a graduate of the

University of Rhode Island with a degree in Biomedical Electronics

Engineering. He was a systems engineer at IBM for 10 years.

Joe has a profound hearing loss, and received his first hearing aid at the

age of four. In October, 2008, Joe's Med-El cochlear implant was activated,

and it has made an enormous difference in his life. Born in Portugal, Joe

moved to the states when he was 14. His wife Meg is also hard of hearing,

and they have four hearing children. In fact, Joe met Meg when SHHH started

a chapter in Northern Virginia, and they were among the first SHHH " couples "

to get married!

Joe's workshop focused mainly on the needs of individuals who are

late-deafened and hard of hearing. He started by asking if hearing aids are

enough, but we all agreed that, for the most part, they are not. They don't

fix the problem the way eyeglasses correct sight, they amplify background

noise, and the more profound the hearing loss is, the harder it is to listen

in noise. So what we need is more direct sound to our ears, a way to reduce

background noise, and make speech sounds more clear.

To begin with, Joe stressed how important it is to get properly fitted

hearing aids, and that they should have telecoils (t-coils, t-switches), and

if possible, direct audio input (DAI). Bluetooth hearing aids are now on

the market - Oticon has the Epoq Streamer, Phonak has the Smartlink, and

Starkey has Eli. Benefits of having the DAI and telecoil include quiet

listening in an airplane, use of FM " boots " with wireless microphones, their

compatibility with Bluetooth devices, telephones and cell phones, iPods and

other listening systems.

Once you have a good hearing aid that works well for your hearing loss,

consider assistive devices to either eliminate or reduce communication

barriers. Some possibilities are FM, infrared, and audio loop listening

systems, Others are amplified phones and phone amplifiers, captioned

telephone and two-line voice carryover, and sound amplification for

notification systems. If it is not possible to have enhanced or accessible

sound, then other options include use ofvisual alerting and vibratactile

devices, and captioning

Amplified phones with an audio jack can be used with neckloops, DAI, and

various headsets. There are also phone amplifiers with volume and tone

control. If amplification on the telephone is not enough, there is the

captioned phone, or CapTel, as well as voice carry over (VCO), two line VCO,

and video phones which enable one to listen and speech read at the same time

because it's synchronized. Joe can use a video phone to talk to his family

in Portugal. Skype, on the other hand, is not synchronized with the audio.

When we talk about a safe and accessible home, we want to be sure we have

the right things in place. Options include smoke and fire detectors, carbon

monoxide and gas detectors, burglary systems, NOAA weather emergency alerts,

water leak detection, distress signaling, and medical alerts. One of the

attendees mentioned that he has the ADT alarm system and they gave him all

the accessibility options at no extra cost, but he assumes it was because he

told them he would use a different security company if they did not.

Smoke detectors with built-in strobes are popular; some local fire

departments sometimes provide free smoke detectors with strobe. You could

also use a stand-alone strobe. The strobes can often be tied in to NOAA and

community alerts. Security systems include those for burglary, weather

emergency, water leak detection, panic button, door entry, and proximity

sensors.

Specialized design for accessibility is critical. The carbon monoxide

detector, gas detector and visual strobe are all important security

components. And there are every day alerts to be considered too: the

doorbell, telephone, video phone, baby crying, alarm clocks, apartment

building intercom, and even timers.

The newest trend in what are called " Smart Homes " is home automation. The

systems can be programmed to monitor and control just about anything in the

home and can be programmed for accessibility purposes. They can be set so

that all the lights in the house will blink to alert occupants to an

emergency condition, and they can even shut down all audio and video (TV

etc.) to alert the user to a possible fire or other warning. Leviton and

Lutron wireless controls are two examples but they require some specialized

planning. These can be integrated with security systems, too.

If you would like to chat with Joe about more details, you can email him at

joe@....

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C2010 by Northern Virginia Resource Center for Deaf and Hard of Hearing

Persons (NVRC), 3951 Pender Drive, Suite 130, Fairfax, VA 22030;

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