Graduate student Lindsey Yarbrough works with Lucy Zhu on some reading exercises while her mother, Julie Sun, and brother, Max, watch from an observation booth. |
Learning to Hear
Eight-year-old Lucy Zhu is making good grades and new friends after a cochlear ear implant and much hard work at UGA's Speech and Hearing Clinic.
Angela Hains MA '06 | Jul 3, 2006
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Eight-year-old Lucy Zhu looks like any other child in her classroom. She is an adorable Chinese girl with a charismatic smile that carries her through good days and bad.
It’s only when you talk to her that you begin to understand the challenge she faces every day behind that smile. She watches your mouth intently as you speak, as if figuring out a puzzle. When she talks she speaks proper English, but the sounds in certain words are missing, and there is a lack of voice inflection.
“This is very normal for a child that has severe to profound hearing loss in both ears,” said Jane Harvey, coordinator of the University of Georgia’s Speech and Hearing Clinic, based in the College of Education.
Yarbrough and Lucy test cochlear implant before starting therapy exercises. |
When Lucy was 18 months old, her pediatrician was concerned that she was not speaking or babbling like most babies at that age.
“She did not say ‘mommy’ or ‘daddy’ and when we’d talk to Lucy her facial expressions were blank, like she didn’t understand,” said father Joe Zhu, who is working on his post doctorate in UGA’s College of Agriculture and Environmental Science.
After running several auditory tests on Lucy, she was diagnosed as being severely to profoundly deaf in both ears.
Her parents were faced with a difficult decision. They lived in Wisconsin at the time where Zhu was pursuing his doctorate, and money was tight.
“There are two sides in the hearing-impaired community,” explained her mother, Julie Sun, “the oral camp versus the sign language camp.”
It is common within the deaf community to choose sign language to communicate, never having to wear a hearing aid or speak orally.
“We want our daughter to be independent one day, not having to rely on translators in class or feel that she only has one community with whom she can communicate,” Sun said.
Although teaching Lucy to talk is more time consuming and difficult initially, Sun said she thinks in the long term it will be more beneficial for her daughter.
Health insurance helped cover the cost of the bilateral hearing aids and therapy sessions.
After completing his doctorate in plant genetics and breeding at the University of Wisconsin at Madison, Zhu’s academic career path brought his family to Athens in 2002 for his post doctorate work in the department of crop and soil sciences.
“The family contacted us (the Speech and Hearing Clinic) to find out what services the University had available for their daughter,” said Holly Kaplan, a clinical audiologist who has worked with the family since their arrival.
In June 2003, after six months of therapy in Athens, Sun and Zhu decided that Lucy would undergo cochlear implant surgery in her left ear, continuing to rely on a hearing aid in her right ear. Only in extreme situations would bilateral cochlear implants be permitted, due to limited research on the long-term effects of the bilateral procedure.
“A cochlear implant is totally different than a hearing aid,” Kaplan explained, “a hearing aid amplifies sound whereas the cochlear implant compensates for damaged parts of the inner ear, electrifying sounds and sending them to the brain.”
Yarbrough and Lucy sing "I'm a Little Teapot" as an exercise. Cards are arranged up or down depending on if it's a high or low note. |
Candidates for the implant are individuals, like Lucy, who are severely hard of hearing. The implant is not a cureall, but it increases the sounds Lucy hears, and in turn, is able to make. More than 100,000 people worldwide have received the surgery that can cost $75,000 or more.
The combination of the cochlear implant, hearing aid and continuous therapy has paid off for the little girl. By the end of first grade, Lucy placed first in her class in math, second in reading and third in spelling.
“Lucy has been in therapy with us for nine consecutive semesters, and although she will have spot checks throughout her life, she won’t need our therapy too much longer.” said Harvey. “She is a very bright girl who will achieve anything she sets her mind to.”
A spot check is the preliminary test Lucy takes prior to starting her oral and audio activities in therapy.
“The spot check is similar to the hearing test every child goes through in elementary school,” said Kaplan, “raise your right hand if you hear a sound in your right ear and so on.”
Lucy’s spot checks allow the clinicians to monitor her cochlear implant and her hearing aid function, so she is constantly absorbing as much sound as possible.
Lucy’s verbal progression up to this point has been steady because her parents are committed to her treatment, said Harvey.
“This year we had therapy at Athens Regional Rehabilitation Clinic on Monday, therapy here (Speech and Hearing Clinic) every Tuesday and Thursday, and rehabilitation at the Auditory Verbal Center (AVC) in Atlanta on Friday,” said Sun.
Additionally, Lucy receives speech therapy at Oconee County Primary School, where she has an FM (sound field) system to help her hear the lessons more clearly. She has recently qualified for the gifted program at school.
Progress with severely hearing-impaired patients is evaluated on a case-by-case basis and in Lucy’s case, Kaplan and Harvey closely monitored her social skills.
“She initiates conversations with the therapist now, which she never did before… that’s huge,” said Harvey.
“Julie stopped me in the hall one day and told me that Lucy had made a friend on her own;” said Kaplan, “it is these things that severely hearing-impaired children have to be taught. These are the stories that enrich our jobs and lives.”
UGA’s Speech and Hearing Clinic, located at 593 Aderhold Hall, is open to the public.
Angela Hains was a College of Education publications assistant during 2005-06.
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