Physical Distancing and Communication for the Hard of Hearing

Many of us will be feeling isolated as we stay home and practice physical distancing during the COVID-19 pandemic. People who have hearing loss often deal with feelings of isolation already, and will be particularly vulnerable to experiencing loneliness, anxiety and depression without social connection. Talking on the phone can be very difficult for people with hearing loss, and it has been shown that using video-calling technologies can improve speech understanding by 23% for people with severe to profound hearing loss (Jepersen & Kirkwood, Hearing Review, 2015). If you have hearing loss and a computer or other device that allows video-calling through FaceTime or Skype or any other video-chat application, give it a try! For the more technically-minded of us out there, try to think of people in your family or community with hearing loss that you could help by talking them through the set up to use video-chat technology. Let’s work together to stay connected!