Audiology Connections - 2021 - 18

AUDIOLOGISTS ADAPT DURING COVID-19 

THOMAS C. EVANS, AUD,
CCC-A
Pediatric Audiologist III, Cincinnati
Children's Hospital Medical Center
It is truly amazing how much
COVID-19 impacted our practice.
Previously, our daily challenges
included covering someone's paid time
off or adding on a couple of patients
who needed their hearing devices
repaired. Those were simple compared
to the challenges that COVID-19
presented for providers and patients.
We shut down our practice completely
for over 2 months, resulting in more
than 1,300 appointment cancellations.
At the onset, we felt that the shutdown
would be short-lived. But after the dust
settled and it was apparent that it was
going to be much longer, we turned
our focus to finding ways to prevent
our patients from going without the
ability to hear and communicate. We
were able to ramp up our telehealth
program to provide some needed
emergent services. Our telehealth
program has been around since 2013,
but it was primarily a pilot initiative
in our division until now. We dusted

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off the equipment, so to speak, and
were able to offer hearing aid repair/
programming, earmold cut-and-fits,
hearing aid evaluations, hearing
aid fittings, hearing aid checks, and
auditory processing consults using
Microsoft Teams and Cisco Jabber. To
this day, we have seen more than 100
patients-and our goal is to sustain,
expand, and fine-tune our program
as we continue to work through the
pandemic and beyond.

REGINA PRESLEY, AUD,
CCC-A, FAAA
Senior Cochlear Implant Audiologist,
Presbyterian Board of Governors
Cochlear Implant Center of
Excellence at GBMC
The landscape of health care will
be forever changed by the pandemic.
While it has created challenges for us
all as we try to provide clinical care, it
has positively impacted our creativity
and outlook for the expansion of our
service delivery model. We have
followed recommended guidelines for
distancing, implemented appropriate
personal protective equipment (PPE),

  2021 AUDIOLOGY CONNECTIONS asha.org/aud

increased our disinfecting policy,
staggered patient appointments, and
reduced contact during the checkin and check-out process. We also
modified and enhanced our delivery
of care. At Greater Baltimore Medical
Center (GBMC), we set up mapping
suites to allow for patient and clinician
safety and still provided adequate
access to speechreading. We used
non-patient time to improve current
patient materials and to develop new
tools to better support patients through
the rehabilitative process. We initiated
remote services for aural rehabilitation
therapy, equipment troubleshooting,
and device counseling. In addition,
we participated in a controlled market
release to allow patients to utilize
an app-based tool that has them
complete a questionnaire. The app
allows us to check the magnet site, run
impedance measures, and complete
an audiogram as well as a speech-innoise task. The COVID-19 experience
has created an openness for both
providers and patients to embrace
alternative forms of care.
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Audiology Connections - 2021

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