Category: Speech and Hearing Science

SHS Clinic gives students, faculty the opportunity to provide clinical services for the community

May 15, 2023 | Bruce Adams

The Audiology and Speech-Language Pathology Clinic is located at 201 S. Oak Street in Champaign
(Photo provided)

Nestled in the University of Illinois’ Research Park is a place where the Department of Speech and Hearing Science improves communication and quality of life using evidence-based practices on a daily basis. This mission goes back to the founding of the department.

The Audiology and Speech-Language Pathology Clinic, operated by SHS, provides a full range of diagnostic and therapeutic services to 200 children and adults annually. The clinic serves individuals in the local community and across Illinois via in-person and telepractice means, providing services to clients across the lifespan. 

May is Better Hearing and Speech Month, and 2023 marks the 50th anniversary of the celebration of that occasion, as well as the 50th anniversary of SHS being established at the University of Illinois. The month’s theme of Building a Strong Foundation and its emphasis on “life-altering treatment” fit nicely with the department’s history of service, instruction and research.

During the month free pediatric and adult hearing and speech-language screenings will be offered to community members. Graduate students will perform the screenings with supervision from certified audiologists and speech-language pathologists. The event will be held at the clinic at 2001 S. Oak St. Suite B in Champaign on the morning of Wednesday, May 24, and the afternoon of Thursday, May 25. All are welcome and can call the clinic at 217-333-2205 if interested in scheduling a free screening.

Other community activities have included:

  • Presentations from second-year masters students at the OSF Heart of Mary Medical Center stroke support group’s monthly meeting.
  • Presentations at the Parkinson’s Disease Support Group of Champaign County about the role of speech-language pathology and its benefits for quality of life in Parkinson’s disease.
  • Convenient, no-charge audiology and hearing care services provide to residents of Clark Lindsey Nursing Home. Doctor of Audiology students informed residents about listening and repair strategies, cleaned and maintained hearing aids, and cleaned earwax out of residents’ ears.
  • Free hearing and speech-language screenings at the Child Development Laboratory on campus and at Chesterbrook Academy Preschool.
  • Sharing information about communication disorders and the services available at the clinic with the community as part of the College of Applied Health Sciences booth at the Urbana Market on the Square.

Graduate students in audiology and speech-language pathology develop knowledge and skills to provide clinical care to the community through their academic coursework and clinical practica experiences.

“As a clinic, we’re working very closely with the department,” said Clarion Mendes, a speech-language pathologist at the clinic and a clinical assistant professor in SHS. As Mendes explains, exposure to the needs of the community in the clinic informs teaching.

“Part of our mission is to intertwine the two and not see them as distinct entities,” she said. “The department has gone through a curriculum revision for the master’s program in recent years that highlights cultural and linguistic diversity, and if we look at that with a broader lens, that also includes looking at speech differences rather than considering them as disabilities. Speaking for myself, my clinical population nearly exclusively consists of marginalized populations. I work nearly exclusively with gender-diverse individuals. Working within that landscape requires a lot of reflection and cultural humility, constantly revising how I approach clinical practice and teach it to my students.”

The clinic gives students the unique opportunity to provide cutting-edge care informed by research and clinical expertise in an immersive environment under the supervision of licensed and nationally certified audiologists and speech-language pathologists. While clients are receiving care, they are contributing to new discoveries in the assessment and treatment of communication disorders and training the next generation of speech, language, and hearing clinicians and researchers.

Working with external partners and increasing the diversity of the student body bring fresh viewpoints and experiences to the clinic and department. In fact, the international composition in the clinical programs body is at a 10-year high, with seven international students in the clinical programs in audiology and speech-language pathology. “Efforts are also underway to expand the accepted insurances to get a broader patient base,” Clinical Assistant Professor Sadie Braun said.

Clinical work powers education and research and has motivated SHS since its humble beginnings. Jennifer Dahman, a speech-language pathologist and clinical assistant professor at SHS, credits her work as a clinical educator for making her a “better speech-language pathologist.”

“Yes, we teach the how, but more importantly, we teach the why,” she said. “And if we don’t know the why then we find out. Being able to explain that active kind of learning perspective to students translates into their service delivery.”

Learn more about the Audiology and Speech-Language Pathology Clinic by visiting the website.

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Can you understand me, Siri?

May 21, 2024 | Anna Flanagan

The Speech Accessibility Project aims to amass a database of audio recordings from people with disabilities that affect their speech. (Getty Images)

Speech recognition software such as Alexa, Google Assistant, Amazon Echo, Cortana and Siri allow anyone to access information and use smart home technologies through spoken questions and commands. At least, that’s what they’re supposed to do. Unfortunately, these devices typically don’t recognize speech that is affected by a disability.

Mark Hasegawa-Johnson, professor of electrical and computer engineering at Illinois, wants to change that. He launched the Speech Accessibility Project (SAP), which aims to amass a database of audio recordings from people with disabilities that affect their speech. Volunteers with Parkinson’s disease, amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), stroke-related disabilities, cerebral palsy and Down syndrome record responses to three different types of prompts to capture commands, phonetically diverse speech such as one might produce when reading aloud, and conversational speech. 

SHS Associate Professors Laura Mattie and Marie Moore Channell are leading the Illinois Down Syndrome Team. “People with Down syndrome have intelligibility issues so it’s common for them to not be understood at all or to be misunderstood by voice recognition systems,” Mattie said. And it’s not just that it’s the hot new thing, as Channell observed. “These systems are among the strategies we put into place to make life easier for people with disabilities,” she said. One can imagine the frustration that results from being unable to use technologies that are supposed to improve your life.

Mattie said she and Channell put a lot of effort into developing the prompts for the recordings “…to make them representative of the kinds of things for which individuals would be using the software.” Added Channell, “It’s about making sure on the front end that the recordings are valuable and representative so that what goes into the database is relevant.”

The Speech Accessibility Project database initially will be available to the consortium of technology companies that are funding the project, including Amazon, Apple, Google, Meta and Microsoft, before becoming widely available to the public.

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Student Spotlight: Charlie Nudelman, a trained ear

May 10, 2023 | Ethan Simmons

Nudelman was raised by a speech language pathologist: His mother

Charles Nudelman, right, with adviser Pasquale Bottalico

What comes to mind when you hear “professional voice-user?” Perhaps the image of an opera singer or a sports announcer pops in your head.

Ask Department of Speech and Hearing Science doctoral candidate Charles Nudelman, and he’ll conjure dozens of examples: Canvassers, radio DJs, telemarketers, clergy and lawyers are just a few of the professions who’ve come to him with vocal problems.

“The voice is something I feel like we take for granted—we wake up in the morning and expect everything to go fine,” Nudelman said. “If you’re relying on your voice for your job, hoarseness is going to get worse as you use it. And there’s a lot of costs related to that.”

After spending a year diagnosing voice issues in a clinical setting, 2019 SHS graduate Nudelman has returned to his alma mater to obtain his doctorate, focusing his research on preventing vocal disorders for the near-30 percent of adults who face them.

Nudelman, from Gurnee, Ill., was raised by a speech language pathologist: His mother. But he came to the University of Illinois with his major undeclared, initially hoping to veer from the course she traveled.

“I wanted to carve out my own path, but I ended up loving the classes and loving the faculty of (SHS),” Nudelman said. “That’s what drew me here to the U. of I., knowing regardless of the path I took I would have a really good education. And it was true.”

Under his advisor and friend SHS Associate Professor Pasquale Bottalico, Nudelman has become a decorated student researcher within the department, receiving the Phyllis Ariens Burkhead Memorial Fellowship and the Elaine Paden Award this spring.

And for his presentation at 2023’s “Research Live!,” where graduate students describe their own studies to a judge panel of high school juniors, he came away with the grand prize of $500.

From the start of his undergraduate experience, Nudelman was using his communication skills often, joining student radio and broadcasting Illinois athletics events through Big Ten Network’s Student U.

“It brought me to figure out what exactly is the voice, how does it work, what is this instrument we all have? And how can I make it better while I’m on TV? That’s a wormhole to itself, and I’m still living in it.”

Those questions brought him to SHS 301: General Speech Science, taught by then-first-year Assistant Professor Bottalico. Nudelman sat in the front row every lecture, taking copious notes. He quickly attached to Bottalico’s “distinct” teaching style, and gratefully accepted an invite to his lab.

For the better part of six years, the pair have worked “nonstop” on projects together, even when Nudelman left to obtain his master’s degree from the MGH Institute for Health Professions in Boston. Now back at the Illinois, he’s set to obtain his Ph.D. in 2025.

“The stars aligned, he’s an amazing mentor and friend and person,” Nudelman said. “He’s not only looking to open doors for me but any person who works with him.”

What’s “astonished” Bottalico about his mentee is how Nudelman has responded to escalating expectations with every new research project. Just one year into his Ph.D. program, Nudelman’s research output is already comparable to that of an advanced scholar, Bottalico said.

“I have a very high standard, it’s not easy to surprise me.” Bottalico said. “And Charlie has done it constantly since we met.”

Nudelman’s winning study for Research Live! took a close look at the vocal performance of teachers. He used a virtual reality headset to simulate various classroom environments for 30 schoolteachers, closely monitoring the acoustics of their voices.

What it showed: Teachers who spoke to virtual classrooms fuller with simulated students reported more vocal discomfort and fatigue, Nudelman said, while larger virtual classrooms negatively affected the teachers’ voice quality.

“I think it’s something to think about within classrooms when class sizes are only increasing and we want our teachers to be comfortable,” Nudelman said. “I guess I’m a proponent for smaller class sizes based on this study.”

He has his sights set on a career in academia, “hopefully being a mentor like Dr. Bottalico has been to me to as many students as I can,” he said. But the doctoral student finds fulfillment in making research accessible to the general public as well.

For example: Instead of clearing your throat before speaking, sip on some water. Avoid whispering — it’s worse for your voice than just talking. And if you’re speaking to a large group, use a microphone and take pauses to breathe to avoid hoarseness afterward.

It’s this brand of practical science that made Nudelman feel right at home at AHS.

“It doesn’t matter what AHS major you are, you’re working with people to improve their quality of life,” he said. “Even though we’re all doing different things, the goal is the same, and you can feel that whenever you’re interacting with anyone in this college.

“It’s a great place to come if you’re interested in helping people.”

Editor’s note:

To reach Ethan Simmons, email ecsimmon@illinois.edu.
 

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Anatomy of a pioneer: Willard R. Zemlin

April 04, 2023 | Bruce Adams

Willard Zemlin, right, uses an early research lab setup to examine the adult oral cavity (Illinois archives)

Willard R. Zemlin was fascinated by how speech and hearing work. He brought an array of skills and interests to the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign. Born in Two Harbors, Minn., he worked in radio and television repair and electronics, was a locomotive engineer with the Duluth, Missabe & Iron Range Railroad and served as a sergeant in the infantry with the U.S. Army in Korea.

Zemlin completed a bachelor’s degree in experimental psychology and a master’s degree in speech pathology at the University of Minnesota. The work done by his wife, Eileen, in speech pathology inspired him to leave his job and pursue a Ph.D. in speech pathology with a focus on vocal science.

Zemlin began making the connection between instruction, clinical practice and research when he joined the Illinois faculty as an assistant professor of Speech and Hearing Science in 1962.

Zemlin directed the Speech and Hearing Research Laboratory from 1962 to 1975. He undertook a systematic and comprehensive investigation of the anatomy and physiology of speech, language and hearing systems. He utilized his considerable photographic skills (with the permission and assistance of the School of Basic Medical Sciences at Illinois) in the laboratory to capture images from stages of the dissection process and used the pictures to supplement his lectures to enhance his students’ understanding of the structures related to human communication. For students, the opportunity to see structures, as opposed to reading about them, clarified the subject matter and made it more interesting.

Zemlin was promoted to associate professor in 1966 and to professor in 1971, with an appointment as professor in the School of Clinical Medicine recognizing his expertise in the anatomical functioning of hearing and speech.

Zemlin was a crucial contributor to the development of innovative laboratory space in the Speech and Hearing Science Building in the 1970s. It was a significant undertaking. His ability to make imaginative use of limited research equipment and simplify learning made him a valued teacher. In turn, Zemlin established lasting relationships with many SHS students as they radiated from campus to work as clinical practitioners, researchers and teachers.

“As a young professor with little money to cover the costs of having conference slides professionally prepared, Willard Zemlin taught me how to shoot and mount my own slides, using his mounted camera in the basement of the SHS Building, said Cynthia Johnson Parsons, an SHS associate professor emerita. “Bill also reminded our communication sciences and disorders field repeatedly that there was a great deal of normal variability in anatomical structures of the speech and hearing mechanism, which was never accounted for in CSD and medical textbooks. He was a strong advocate for observing and studying as many exemplars of an anatomical structure as you could find across people, in order to realize when a structure deviated substantially from normally functioning ones.”

In 1968, Zemlin wrote in the foreword to the first edition of his pioneering book, Speech and Hearing Science: Anatomy and Physiology: “Each of us who is concerned with the rehabilitation of speech, language and hearing should be able to visualize the anatomical structures involved, to understand their usual functions, and to hypothesize how they might function under adverse circumstances.”

The book utilized his laboratory photographs and displayed his skill in drawing diagrams, resulting in more than 400 images and illustrations. With this collection, Zemlin captured every bone, cartilage, muscle and tissue related to the speech and hearing mechanisms. At that time, David Kuehn, SHS professor emeritus, said the book was “clearly the best, [if not] the only, text that dealt specifically with anatomy and physiology of the speech and hearing mechanisms.” Kuehn considered it to be a magnificent text, praising it for its timeless content.

Zemlin’s textbook became the most widely and longest-used one in the field—his legacy, according to Kuehn. Current and former faculty members in SHS remember learning from it as students and later using it in classes they taught. Pamela Hadley, SHS professor and department head, said she “actually traced all those illustrations to make flashcards with the origin, insertion, fiber direction and function listed on the back.” Johnson Parsons said, “After I graduated from the University of Iowa, I continued to use the textbook and its illustrations when I taught phonetics and articulation/phonological disorders courses at the University of Minnesota, Northwestern University and the University of Illinois.” Kuehn used the textbook to teach the SHS course in the anatomy and physiology of the speech mechanism.

Later editions of Speech and Hearing Science included images of laryngeal behavior that Zemlin captured using an innovative photographic method he developed using a high-speed motion picture camera. Patricia Monoson from the University of Arkansas described it in the introduction to the fourth edition in 1998 as “the book you are about to read, learn, study and use as a reference for the rest of your professional life.”

Read more about Zemlin:

Zemlin bio from Illinois Distributed Museum

Shaping the teachings of speech, hearing anatomy for decades

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Department of Speech and Hearing Science rose from a humble start

March 09, 2023 | Bruce Adams

In 2023, SHS celebrated its 50th anniversary. The articles below highlight the key people and research that shaped SHS into the strong program it is today.

Dr. Severina Nelson (left) was a pioneer in the field of speech therapy. (photo courtesy University of Illinois Archives)

As humble beginnings go, it would be difficult to top that of the Department of Speech and Hearing Science at the University of Illinois.

In 1938, Dr. Severina E. Nelson repurposed a closet in Lincoln Hall to start an outreach program providing speech therapy. She began by assisting a student with some articulation difficulties. Sharing an office with colleagues and unable to find a private room, Nelson said, “Finally, the janitor volunteered to donate his mop closet so that I could set up a speech therapy lab. He moved to the basement.”

If that were all there was to it, Nelson would go down in campus history as one of the more determined, innovative, and resourceful professors at Illinois and as a founder of what, in 1973, became the Department of Speech and Hearing Science (SHS).

But there is more to Severina Nelson, and SHS, than that.

“Nowadays, our culture is notoriously rough on the dedicated person with a cause, especially a woman,” wrote a group of students to Nelson upon her retirement in 1964. “It is true that all new concepts only get recognition after someone has spent years being persistent and farsighted until finally, the disbelievers are made uncomfortable and become believers. You’ve been a woman with a gleam in your eye, and thank heaven, you never became a casualty of our system.”

Nelson earned her B.S. in 1918 and her M.A. in 1923 in English at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. She began her professional life as a high school teacher in Iowa, coming back to Urbana-Champaign in 1920 as an associate instructor in the Division of Public Speaking in the Department of English. After earning her M.A. degree, she pursued a career teaching interpretive speech. She was an engaging speaker, giving countless readings for campus groups, on tours across Illinois, and on radio shows. This led to her co-authoring a best-selling speech textbook with Charles H. Woolbert in 1927: The Art of Interpretive Speech (with a fourth edition still in press in the 1960s).

In 1932, Nelson was elected president of Sigma Delta Phi, a national honorary women’s dramatic and speaking fraternity. Fittingly, it was Nelson who introduced aviator Amelia Earhart during her March 21, 1935 appearance on campus—two years before Earhart’s disappearance. Nelson had built a profile as a director of dramatic productions, including those for the Women’s League, the annual Homecoming “Stunt Show,” and the Hillel Players.

Nelson earned her Ph.D. in 1938 in Speech Pathology at the University of Wisconsin in Madison and then did post-doctoral work at the New York Medical College. The work Nelson began by helping college students with speech difficulties received funding and was then extended to community members. In 1938, she brought clinical practice at the University of Illinois into existence by establishing its speech clinic, serving as its director from 1939-59 and as a professor of speech from 1941-64. Some of Nelson’s early research in speech disorders focused on stuttering. She published three seminal articles from 1939-45 in the Quarterly Journal of Speech and The Journal of Pediatrics, on the role of heredity in stuttering, and in the Journal of Speech Disorders, on stuttering in twin types.

In 1939, the Daily Illini described Nelson as “one of the most popular instructors in summer school,” noting that “her office is different from the usual. Here you open the door and find yourself looking into a full-length mirror. Vanity isn’t the reason for the mirror’s being there. She finds it very useful in her speech correction work. Just during the past year, the speech department has made great advances in this work, and much of it has been under Miss Nelson’s supervision. Patients are studied and classified according to their type of speech defect, then they are turned over to students in speech correction classes for help.” (Please see Editor’s Note below regarding terminology use in historical records) Most of the student therapists were women whom Nelson supported as the faculty advisor to the campus chapter of Zeta Phi Eta, the national women’s speech sorority.

By 1940, Nelson had secured a $2,000 grant to support her clinic and extensive office and clinical space in Gregory Hall, where individuals with cerebral palsy, hearing disabilities, and cleft palate received therapy. She also had established an educational program in speech therapy at the University of Illinois, with four years of undergraduate coursework and one year of graduate study. From 1943-1944, as the chair of a state legislative committee, Nelson delivered 50 to 75 speeches throughout Illinois to win passage of the committee’s bill to provide supplemental funds for local clinical efforts. With the onset of the World War II, veterans were returning with “organic and psychological disabilities.” The clinic’s funding from the farsighted bills in the Illinois legislature was augmented by federal assistance to veterans. Twenty-seven nationwide colleges and universities received this funding, notably clustered in the Midwest around the University of Illinois, including Indiana University, Northwestern University, the University of Michigan, and several branches of what would become the University of Wisconsin system.

The demand for speech and hearing specialists was such that Nelson wrote to her department head in 1945 that the University of Illinois Speech and Hearing Clinic was competing against Army and Navy hospitals to recruit therapists for work in the Champaign and Urbana school districts. By 1946, there had been 16 master’s theses recorded in Speech and Hearing Science.

In 1950, under Nelson’s leadership and advocacy the clinic moved to the Lorado Taft House on campus (though, as she wrote in a letter, Nelson was convinced the University planned to demolish the building.) The St. Louis Post-Dispatch reported that “her enthusiasm, plus a brisk business-like air, are reflected in the rest of her efficient and enthusiastic staff.” A newsletter describing “Dr. Severina Nelson’s informative, vivid, and impressive account of the Illinois Speech Clinic” to the Urbana Rotary Club in January 1955 noted that “Professor Nelson filled her talk with case histories … all interesting. Urbana Rotary played a large part in sparking the state’s program—a program which for some years has been one of the best in the Union.”

When Nelson stepped down as director of the speech clinic in 1959, it had 10 full-time therapists. She resumed full-time teaching in speech pathology and oral interpretation, and by then, had advised more than 125 graduate theses. With her national renown, she was often requested as a speaker by groups and organizations across the country. After retiring in 1964, Nelson moved to Dallas and in 1978, received Honors of the Association from the Illinois Speech-Language-Hearing Association.

Contributor: Cynthia Johnson Parsons

Editor’s Note: As in many fields, perspectives and terminology in speech and hearing science (also called communication sciences and disorders) have evolved over the years, away from those appearing early in the historical record. For example, our focus has shifted away from correcting a person’s speech defects toward improving the intelligibility of their speech and enhancing the effectiveness of their communication with others.

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CHAD symposium returns with thanks for pilot grants

March 03, 2023 | Vince Lara-Cinisomo

Pilot grants reignite Chad Symposium, fostering research collaboration and innovation

KCH Associate Professor Naiman Khan’s presentation was titled “Role of Omega-3 Lipid Metabolites in Obesity and Cognitive Function” (Photo by Lisa Bralts)

The first Center for Health, Aging, and Disability (CHAD) symposium since 2017 was a celebration of the research accomplished with the help of the Pilot Grant Program.

Three researchers from the College of Applied Health Sciences—Naiman Khan, an associate professor in Kinesiology and Community Health; Brian Monson, an assistant professor in Speech and Hearing Science, and Sharon Zou, an assistant professor in Recreation, Sport and Tourism, made a point of thanking CHAD’s grants for helping launch their studies.

Khan, whose presentation was titled “Role of Omega-3 Lipid Metabolites in Obesity and Cognitive Function,” said CHAD’s funding was vital to his work.

“CHAD was really helpful in us starting a new line of engagement of research,” he said. 

CHAD director Jeff Woods, AHS’ associate dean for research, said to date, 38 pilot grants have been awarded since CHAD was launched in 2010, with $860,000 awarded to AHS researchers for pilot research. Woods described CHAD’s role as “work at the bookends of medicine … with the goal of improving people’s lives.”

“CHAD pilot grants are really important for junior faculty,” Zou said.

And the payoff has been well worth it, Woods said, citing the return on investment as approximately $16 in external funding to $1 in CHAD funding. 

Zou’s presentation was titled “Exploring an Efficient and Equitable Entrance Fee for Public Lands: A Community-based investigation in the Indiana Dunes National Park.”

“I study how people have fun,” Zou said, explaining that it was vital for public parks and other tourism industries to build a sustainable revenue model and not to rely on decreasing funding from state and federal sources. 

The primary purpose of Zou’s study was to “understand visitors’ and surrounding community residents’ perceptions of Indiana Dunes National Park user fees to inform a fee structure that balances revenue generation and equitable access.”

During and after the COVID-19 pandemic, Zou said, “parks saw explosions of people visiting.” While that was great for parks in terms of revenue, it also led to increasing operation costs at a time when government funding for these sites is being reduced.

“The specific goal is to find out how visitors see the park fees, and are they fair?,” Zou said.

The RST researcher said her preliminary findings indicate there was no consensus from study participants on what “fair” means, and that tension between fairness principles partly explains the longstanding controversy and debate on public land user fees.

Khan’s presentation focused on how poor lifestyle choices can predict an early onset of dementia, noting that obesity worldwide has increased threefold since the 1980s. The KCH researcher said his research, in conjunction with Aditi Das of Georgia Tech, suggested that the a deficiencyin the hormone dehydroepiandrosterone (DHEA)—which has been reported to have beneficial effects on obesity, diabetes mellitus, and serum lipids in animals—was associated with individuals with a body-mass index (BMI) of 25 or higher, which is classified as obese.

“BMI is inversely connected to cognitive function,” Khan said. “Only in obese individuals do we see DHEA increase in circulation.” Khan said his preliminary results found:

  • Circulating Omega-3 metabolites were higher among persons with higher weight status and the levels were associated with degree of fat mass
  • Circulating metabolites inversely associated with cognitive function
  • Only observed among persons with overweight and obesity
  • Selectively associated with hippocampal function
  • Implications for memory function

Khan said his overarching goal was to “develop effective lifestyle approaches to improve cognitive function.”

SHS’ Monson discussed his study called “Capturing Prenatal Auditory Experience.”

“If there was a pregnant woman in this audience, that baby would be hearing my voice, and perhaps making judgments,” he said, drawing laughter from the gathering. “How do we know? Because full-term newborns come to the world with memories of what they’ve heard, including the mother’s voice.”

In utero, Monson explained, was a unique acoustic environment. When preterm infants are delivered, they are placed into incubators, which rapidly changed the sound profile, he said. The consequences of those changes include increased risk for sensorineural hearing loss, auditory neuropathy, language and speech developmental delays, auditory attention deficits and auditory processing disorder.

Monson’s study involved a group of pregnant women wearing a LENA listening device twice a week during the third trimester, while the device was placed into cribs of very preterm infants at Carle Foundation Hospital three times a week through their stay in a neonatal intensive care unit (NICU).

“Fetuses are getting 2.5 hours a day of speech exposure vs. 32 minutes a day for very preterm infants,” he said. “It’s an alarming difference to me.”
NICU infants may incur a deficit of about 150 hours of speech exposure over the course of the preterm period, he explained.

One of the possible mitigation strategies for very preterm infants could be to provide meaningful targets (about three hours a day of speech exposure) to optimize auditory exposures in NICU settings.

“The maternal heartbeat is never turned off in utero,” he said. “The maternal heartbeat is never turned on in NICU.”

Following the CHAD Pilot Grant success stories, Wendy Rogers, the Shahid and Ann Carlson Khan Professor of Applied Health Sciences, talked about the work of Collaborations in Health, Aging, Research, & Technology (CHART).

CHART’s mission is to enable successful aging through:

  • Fundamental research
  • Advanced technology development
  • Education of researchers, developers, healthcare professionals, older adults
  • Guidance for policy decision-making
  • Translation of these efforts to positively affect the lives of older adults

CHART was the first research theme of the College of Applied Health Sciences and boasts the development of the McKechnie Family LIFE Home, an interdisciplinary research facility and simulated home environment that helps promote community engagement, industry partnerships, healthcare collaborations and faculty innovation.

Also part of the symposium was the introduction of a new AHS research theme called CARD (Collaborations in the Advancement of Research on Disability), led by KCH Associate Professor Laura Rice and KCH Professor John Kosciulek. CARD is focused on enhancing the health and quality of life of people with disabilities—through research that addresses critical gaps in disability-related knowledge and outreach that engages individuals with disabilities. 

CARD’s short-term goals include:

  • Develop a collaborative working group
  • Develop communication strategies
  • Establish a steering committee of stakeholders
  • Develop and implement outreach and engagement events

Longer-term goals include:

  • Host a bi-annual research symposium
  • Develop a “toolkit” for UIUC faculty to support the performance of disability-related research in the Champaign-Urbana area
  • Respond to disability-related funding opportunities
  • Establish a competitive program to provide supplemental funding to support ongoing disability research among junior faculty
  • Host a seminar series with external experts
  • Establish a research training program for students registered with DRES interested in doing research
  • Support the development of new research registries and/or expansion of current registries

The first CARD meeting is set for March 22.

In kicking off the symposium, AHS Dean Cheryl Hanley-Maxwell said CHAD was “one of the biggest attractions” of her decision to come to Illinois and lead the college.

“When I thought about CHAD, I thought it’d be interesting to lead a college that has this kind of momentum to it, and I’ve been proven correct, year after year,” she said. “CHAD provides students with real-world engagement, and plays an absolutely critical role in their professional development.”

Woods agreed.

“We’re helping put the next generation of scientists into the field.”

Editor’s note:

To reach Vince Lara-Cinisomo, email vinlara@illinois.edu.
 

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2023 AHS Distinguished Lecturer Series—Dr. Travis T. Threats

Feb. 09, 2023 | Vince Lara-Cinisomo

Differences versus Disparities:  Use of the WHO’s International Classification of Functioning, Disability, and Health (ICF) Framework to Critically Evaluate Health Outcomes

Saint Louis University Speech, Language and Hearing Sciences Chairperson Travis Threats. (Photo provided)

About the Presentation

In looking at different populations, it is important to distinguish between differences and disparities. With a differences orientation we look at the population’s own perceived strengths and areas of wanted improvement. With the disparities orientation, we view the “winners” and “losers” of “the system.” Looking at aggregate group differences also obscures the wide within group variation a given population. Thus, even disparities research and thought can have implicit biases. In this presentation, the World Health Organization’s International Classification of Functioning, Disability, and Health (ICF) will be used as a framework and classification system to take a more comprehensive and person-centered view of the wide variety of health indicators within any given population.

About Dr. Threats

Travis T. Threats, Ph.D. is Professor and Chair of the Department of Speech, Language & Hearing Sciences at Saint Louis University. His primary scholarly work has been with the World Health Organization (WHO) on the International Classification of Functioning, Disability and Health (ICF). He has been the American Speech-Language-Hearing Association’s (ASHA) representative liaison to the WHO since 1999. He has worked on other projects for WHO including the disability sections of the ICD-11. Dr. Threats has also published and presented internationally on his three other scholarly interests: spirituality/religiosity in rehabilitation, evidence-based practice, and rehabilitation ethics. Dr. Threats is an ASHA Fellow and ASHA 2012 recipient of the Certificate of Recognition for Outstanding Contributions in International Achievement. He is a Distinguished Scholar and Fellow of the National Academies of Practice. In 2022, he was awarded Honors of the Association by the American Speech-Language-Hearing Association (ASHA), the highest honor given by ASHA.

Watch the lecture

Editor’s note:

To reach Vince Lara-Cinisomo, email vinlara@illinois.edu.
 

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New AI institute to focus on the speech language pathology needs of children

Jan. 10, 2023 | Vince Lara-Cinisomo

The award will establish the AI Institute for Exceptional Education to advance foundational AI technologies

The University of Illinois is part of a nine-university consortium led by the University of Buffalo that has been awarded a $20 million grant by the National Science Foundation to establish a national institute that develops artificial intelligence systems that identify and assist young children with speech and/or language processing challenges. The award will establish the AI Institute for Exceptional Education to advance foundational AI technologies, human-centered AI design, and learning science that improve educational outcomes for young children. 

The institute will help address the nationwide shortage of speech-language pathologists and provide services to children ages 3 to 10 who are at increased risk of falling behind in their academic and socio-emotional development – issues exacerbated by the COVID-19 pandemic.

Pamela Hadley, professor and head of the Department of Speech and Hearing Science at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, is one of the co-principal investigators for the grant. 

“In light of the shortage of speech-language pathologists nationwide, there is a pressing need to develop health technologies that can help identify young children at-risk for speech and language disorders at younger ages and do so more efficiently,” said Hadley, a fellow of the American Speech-Language Hearing Association. “Our multidisciplinary team will enhance automatic speech recognition systems, improving early identification and interventions for children with developmental language disorder and other conditions that affect speech and language. Our team will also create advanced artificial intelligence systems that will support tailored interventions for children on the caseloads of speech-language pathologists. By doing so, we will create educational environments that help children thrive socially and academically.”

Institute will help underserved students

The AI Institute for Exceptional Education will focus on serving the millions of children nationwide who, under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act, require speech and language services.
Specially, it will develop two advanced AI solutions: the AI Screener for early identification of potential speech and/or language disorders; and the AI Orchestrator, which will act as a virtual teaching assistant by providing students with ability-based interventions.

The AI Screener will listen to and observe children in the classroom, collecting samples of children’s speech, facial expressions, gestures and other data. It will create weekly summaries of these interactions that catalogue each child’s vocabulary, pronunciation, video snippets and more. These summaries will help teachers monitor their students’ speech and language abilities and, if needed, suggest a formal evaluation with a speech-language pathologist.

The AI Orchestrator is an app that will help speech-language pathologists, most of whom have caseloads so large that they must provide group-based interventions for children instead of individualized care. The app addresses this by recommending personalized content tailored to students’ needs. It continues to monitor students’ progress and adjusts lesson plans to ensure that the interventions are working.

“The AI Institute for Exceptional Education follows 18 already established NSF-led AI Institutes, an ecosystem of AI research and education in pursuit of transformational advances in AI research and development of AI-powered innovation,” NSF Program Director James Donlon said. “We are happy to welcome this new team to the AI Institutes program.”

Institute comprises top research universities

The institute will consist of more than 30 researchers from nine universities including the University of Buffalo; Stanford University; the University of Washington; Cornell University; the University of Nevada, Reno; the University of Texas at El Paso; Penn State University; and the University of Oregon.

Other investigators at Illinois are Heng Ji (Computer Science), Mark Hasegawa-Johnson (Electrical and Computer Engineering), Yun Huang (Information Science), Hedda Meadan-Kaplansky (Special Education), and Windi Krok (Speech and Hearing Science).

“We are eager to see how this team advances AI research to develop better solutions for children with specific speech-language needs, as well as their families and the U.S. schools who serve them. This project is a great example of how we can harness the opportunities that AI technologies can offer to enhance the services that our nation can offer the American people,” NSF Program Director Fengfeng Ke said.

Editor’s note:

To reach Vince Lara-Cinisomo, email vinlara@illinois.edu.
 

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SHS audiologist ‘hopeful’ about hearing aid ruling

Oct. 21, 2022 | Vince Lara-Cinisomo

Adults with mild to moderate hearing loss are able to purchase hearing aids without a prescription

After a recent FDA decision, hearing aids are now available over the counter.

A decision by the Food and Drug Administration that permits hearing aids to be sold without consulting a medical professional could be a positive development, Speech and Hearing Science audiologist Sadie Braun said.

But, as she’s fond of saying, consumers might have to “play it by ear”.

The FDA ruling, which was finalized in August and took effect on Oct. 17, allows adults with mild or moderate hearing loss to purchase a hearing aid without prescription. The ruling will create more competition and lead to quick technology advancements and lower device costs, but without FDA approval a company cannot classify its product as a “hearing aid.” Per the FDA, the devices covered are air-conduction hearing aids, which fit either in the ear canal or sit behind the ear. Other types of hearing  devices include cochlear implants or bone-anchored systems.

While there are plenty of positives to the new rule, it is important to stress that hearing aids are not a one-size-fits-all proposition, Braun said.

“I am a little nervous about the idea that some people who are self-diagnosing may not actually have a mild-to-moderate hearing loss,” she said. “They might be getting hearing aids that are not ideal for them. More importantly, I’m worried that by removing audiologists and ear, nose, and throat doctors from that process altogether, that patients might not get the care that they need for some of those more significant auditory and medical conditions that can be related to the ears and can be very serious if left untreated, such as acoustic neuromas, and Meniere’s disease, to name a couple.”

Given those concerns, Braun recommends that anyone who is considering trying an over-the-counter device make an appointment with an audiologist for an initial hearing test.

That said, Braun believes the ruling will end up being a good thing for “our patients, for audiology, and for the hearing aid industry on the whole.”

“I think that this legislation definitely opens the door for some of our traditionally underserved and underrepresented populations and communities so that they can obtain devices that can help them hear better that they might not have otherwise been able to obtain,” she said, citing the cost of hearing aids. 

The average price for a pair of prescription hearing aids is $4,600, but OTC hearing aids are expected to cost far less. The federal government estimates Americans could save up to $3,000 on hearing aids by choosing OTC brands rather than prescription devices. If that’s the case, the average cost for a pair of OTC hearing aids would be around $1,600. One wrinkle is that there are now several different devices that can be used to amplify sound for a multitude of purposes: hearing aids and Personal Sound Amplification Products, better known as PSAPs, and it can be difficult for consumers to differentiate them.

“The big difference with PSAPs is that they are not meant to treat hearing loss,” Braun said. “They are actually for normal-hearing individuals only. And they’re therefore not classified as medical devices. Instead, they’re considered electronic products. Because of this, they are not regulated at all by the FDA. One example of something the FDA determines with medical devices is age limitations and requirements, and they have stated that OTC aids are ‘not intended for use by individuals who are younger than 18’.  However, while they say that in the rules and regulations, they do not require age verification before over-the-counter hearing aid purchase. But on PSAPs, for example, there’s no recommended requirement.”

Another benefit of the FDA OTC rules, Braun believes, is they will go a long way toward ensuring safety standards for OTC devices.

“The rules and regulations that took years to develop and fine-tune are critical pieces in this OTC legislation,” she said. “We really have to have those built-in safety mechanisms to protect the consumer, to make sure the consumer does not get injured. Also, we have to make sure that these devices meet a set of standards, a set of criteria, to be sure that they do what they claim they will do, or what they are intended to do. Without those regulations in place, I would be much more wary of recommending OTC hearing aids as an option for some of my patients who have mild-to-moderate hearing loss.”

Still, Braun cautions that in the early stages of the aftermath of the rules, much is yet to be determined, and she stresses the need for professional guidance.

“Each person has a different and unique set of needs,” she said. “Some individuals can navigate that process, on their own and potentially be successful with over-the-counter devices. I think that other individuals really need that guidance of a professional to help them through the entire process from start to finish and to be there for support and assistance the entire way. Over-the-counter hearing aids cut out the service component, and that professional service component is what a lot of patients really rely heavily on.”

One way to access that professional service is through SHS’s Audiology & Speech-Language Pathology Clinic. You can reach clinicians by calling 217-333-2205 or emailing shsclinic@illinois.edu.
 

Editor’s note:

To reach Sadie Braun, email svojak@illinois.edu.
 

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Q&A with RST student Emily Jordan

Oct. 22, 2022 | Vince Lara-Cinisomo

Vince Lara at the University of Illinois spoke with RST student Emily Jordan about her academic career, her Joan Braswell Scholarship, her work with the NJACC tournament and why she chose RST.

VINCE LARA: All right, so Emily, the first question I wanted to ask you is what made you choose the University of Illinois?

EMILY JORDAN: Well, originally, back in 2020, when I was about to graduate with my associate’s degree, I went to Danville Area Community College, where my associate’s is from. My original plan, before COVID hit, I went and visited three different schools, and the U of I was one of them just because I actually only live about 45 minutes away from campus, so I grew up coming over here coming the games and stuff all the time. So I was already kind of familiar with everything. I just wanted to see what the actual school was like.

So when I visited here originally, I was thinking I was going to major in communications because that’s what my associate’s is in. So when I did my visit over here, I actually spoke with a communications advisor, and I told her what I wanted to do and everything, and she actually redirected me to RST, which is where I’ll be graduating now. So that’s how it ended up. I realized that it was a good fit for me. I’m familiar with it over here. I could live at home, save money, and everything like that, so that ended up being why I came over here.

VINCE LARA: Yeah, and that answers the second question I had for you, which was why RST? And RST does have some similarities to communications. So when you were looking into RST at first, what really appealed to you there?

EMILY JORDAN: I guess I wanted something that was very people-based. I feel like I need communication with people all the time. I don’t see myself working at a sit down job. I need that interaction and everything. And so when I looked into RST more, after discussing different options with that communications advisor, I kind of figured out like, OK, these classes look really appealing to me, it all seems really enjoyable and something that could lead me to a really strong career, and it’s focusing on something that I really want to do, and more sport-based.

Communications is like a big bubble, so it’s really wide, and that’s why you can kind of go different routes with them. So that’s why I wasn’t sure what it was like over here, but I realized that RST encompassed a lot of things that I wanted to learn about and kind of navigate through as I got my bachelor’s degree.

VINCE LARA: Yeah, that’s a good point. And you talked about it being a big bubble, but it’s interesting that I noticed recently– part of the reason I’m having Emily on the podcast is that she won the Joan Braswell Scholarship at the RST scholarship ceremony, and as part of that social media post that we did over here, it mentioned that you wanted to be an athletic director. So I wonder how you made that leap from a communications associate’s degree to RST to now thinking about that as a future career?

EMILY JORDAN: Well, I took a class last semester, in the fall of 2021, and actually, that was my first semester physically on campus because my junior year, when I transferred here, everything was online. So when I came over here in person as a senior last semester, I was kind of worried and intimidated a little bit– a big school and everything. But once I got settled down in the classes and stuff, I felt comfortable in everything.

But one of the classes that I took was Dr. Welty-Peachey’s class. It’s RST 430, and it’s a Sport and Development class, and that was probably one of my favorite ones I’ve taken over here. It talks about how we can use sport as a tool to kind of help develop athletes and develop different parts of life as well as helping athletes be better in the sport that they want to be in.

And I think that kind of opened my eyes as to, OK, I think I have a passion for trying to fix the problems that are within sports because obviously, everything has issues and flaws, but I think that that’s where I found my passion was that I want to keep, especially, kids and youth and high school athletes involved in sports just because I know all the benefits that come from playing and participating in them.

So that’s kind of where I learned like, OK, I feel like, as an athletic director, I could help navigate athletes into the routes that they want to go in and steer them in the right direction and resolve those problems that are taking place as of today. And that’s kind of where I learned that being an AD might be a good fit for me.

VINCE LARA: I’m curious about what or who inspired your love of sports.

EMILY JORDAN: So I’m the youngest of my family. I have two older brothers, and I grew up watching them play sports. They played soccer, a little bit of football, a lot of basketball, track, baseball a little bit, so I just like grew up watching them play everything and, of course, as a younger little sister, you want to do everything that your older brothers or siblings are doing.

So that’s kind of how I got into playing T-ball as a little kid, and then that grew into softball, and then I played soccer just like they did and ended up playing school volleyball, and I ran a little bit of track and played basketball like them. So that’s kind of where it stemmed from. I mentioned before, too, we would always as a family come over to the U of I and watch basketball games and football games. So I kind of just grew up playing them and being around them all the time. We talk about it all the time still today. So that’s kind of where that all stems from.

VINCE LARA: Yeah, that makes sense. And recently, you were an announcer for the Men’s National Junior College Athletic Association Division II basketball tournament. How did that come about? Did you express interest? Did someone seek you out? Tell me how that came together.

EMILY JORDAN: When I was at Danville Area Community College, I took some college classes, like dual credit classes, in high school, so I was already familiar with DACC. And then when I graduated high school, that’s where I finished my associates at for that remaining one year. And one of the classes I took was like a media production class, and the assistant professor I had, her named Laura Hensgen, and she’s kind of in charge of the media department there and everything, and DACC has hosted that tournament, the championship portion of the tournament for– I think it’s been 29 years, I believe. So they’re very familiar with it and everything.

So they have broadcasters and the radio and the livestream come out and everything, and there was myself and another student in her class at the time that was interested in media broadcasting, media stuff, sports in general, and she just asked us if we would be interested in doing it, if that would be a good opportunity to expand our horizons a little bit and get us some experience and everything. So I’m not going to lie, I was a little intimidated just because it’s a big setting and everything, but myself and the other student ended up doing it that first year of 2020.

But then, of course, COVID happened, so that season got cut short. And then when I actually came over here to the U of I my junior year, she asked me to come back, even though I wasn’t a student at DACC anymore. She asked me to come back and commentate again, and so I did it with that student there that following year, as well as I did it with my dad too. So it was really cool to do it, come back and do it, and do it for a full season because I didn’t get that opportunity before. But that’s kind of how it all got started and everything.

VINCE LARA: You said you did it with your dad. Is your dad a broadcaster?

EMILY JORDAN: Yeah, so I live over in Vermilion County, and one of the radio stations, he will do some high school basketball games here and there. And they’ve asked him to do that tournament, the NJCAA tournament there, so he did that one with me. We’ve actually called some of the Vermilion County high school basketball tournament games together too, so it’s been really fun to have that experience with my dad too because, obviously, that doesn’t come around too often, but it was really a lot of fun to do it with him as well as with that teacher at DACC and the other student at DACC.

VINCE LARA: Sure, and DACC being, of course, Danville Area Community College, just for our listeners’ context there. So the obvious next question to you is why not pursue sports media because it seems like you’re really passionate about it and your dad is involved, and so why not go that way?

EMILY JORDAN: Well, I think it goes back to that class that I took last semester. I think that the media world obviously is a huge part of today’s society and how we function and everything, how we get our information, and spread information, and stuff like that. I think it’s a super unique job. Originally, I wanted to do social media or marketing for a team of some sort. That was my original thought.

But I think I was passionate about it too, and broadcasting I enjoy and everything, but I think that where my– I want to get like a lot of fulfillment out of what I do, so I think that helping athletes in some way, making sure they stay involved in sports and, like I said, fixing the issues that are in the systems right now, I think those are really important so we can see the same participation levels throughout time and everything.

And I feel like I’ll get the most fulfillment out of doing something like that versus doing a sports media type job, I would say, just because that I know I’d be helping more people in that way. Not that sports media, obviously, is any– isn’t bad or anything, but I just think I would get more fulfillment out of helping athletes and stuff like that.

VINCE LARA: Sure. Have you had a chance at all to spend any time with Josh Whitman or kind of shadow him?

EMILY JORDAN: No, but I’m going to be doing my internship as part of– I’m not sure if you know, but the RST internship we have to do as part of our degree work requirement– this summer, I will be doing it under the athletic director and the media productions person Laura as I mentioned before. I’ll be working under them this summer at DACC as well. So that’ll be, I think, a really good interesting time for me and kind of allow me to see what it’s like being an AD, so I’m really looking forward to that as well.

VINCE LARA: Yeah, that’s terrific. And I think to wrap up I’d like to just ask, what would you tell other students who may be in a similar situation that you were at the end of your associate’s degree about RST, and how would you recommend the program to them?

EMILY JORDAN: I would say, when I was getting ready to transfer and I was looking at the schools I was looking at, the U of I seems massive. I mean, that was my initial thought, and what I told my parents and everything, but there’s 50,000 to 60,000 kids that come here, and it just seems so big and everything.

But when I actually came here and visited campus and stuff and saw that it’s like you know broken down into colleges and then your major and everything, I think that it helped it be more appealing to me, and also made me feel more at ease and comfortable with coming here, especially since it is so big. But in all honesty, I still feel like I’m kind of going to a community college. I’m not traveling across campus for classes or sitting in super big classes with 100 to 200 kids or anything like that. I really feel comfortable here knowing that I’m in the right major, and then with RST, I think that you’re going to get a lot of experiences out of being in that major.

It’s not necessarily a lot of book work. Obviously, there’s things you take from text and apply it to real life, but I think it’s more real life scenarios that you learn hands-on and in the classroom that can help you further on in your career. So I think that’s why it was so eye-opening for me and really attractive to me to come to RST because I felt that I would get the most out of majoring in this major. So it just felt like that. It felt comfortable, it felt right, and it just, like I said, would be an awesome experience for anyone, I think, who’s interested in this kind of work.

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