3. July 2010 by Cape Cod Chapter HLAA Blog.

Brenda Battat, Executive Director of the Hearing Loss Association of America, will speak at the Saturday, October 16th meeting.

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7. March 2010 by Cape Cod Chapter HLAA Blog.

– Here’s some information from another HLA member about You Tube captions.  It’s a great start, though if you are NOT hearing impaired, you should look at Sandra Bullock’s Oscar acceptance speech to see why captioning by human beings is better than voice recognition captioning.  As Dana said, it can be funny, unless you really want to know what someone is saying.  –

As I hope most everyone knows, YouTube recently started providing
automatic transcription/captioning for all new videos uploaded to
YouTube.

I just did a search for a new video to doublecheck on how to make the
captions appear.  It turns out that there are a couple of steps to
take to turn the automatic captioning on for the first time, and that
merely seeing the “CC” with a red background on the bottom of the
video isn’t enough to see captions now.

For example, go to:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QtZLvFrl6qk&feature=aso

Click on the “CC” on the bottom part of the video and wait for the
menu to pop up.

Click on “Transcribe Audio (Beta)” at the top.  This turns on the automatic
transcription/captioning which is done for new videos. (Most older
videos won’t have that feature enabled yet.)

After activating the automatic captioning, one can then choose to change
the caption settings (the font and the size of the captions)  and
one’s account settings (if you don’t have an account on YouTube, it’s
helpful to set one up so you can set captioning preferences, save your
favorites, create playlists, etc.).  I just changed my YouTube account
settings so that automatic captioning is always activated.

The captioning is pretty cool!

Note that the automatic captioning will invariably have errors in it
if the owner of the video hasn’t corrected it. Some of the captioning
will probably be funny when it hasn’t been corrected yet.  <g>

Dana

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22. February 2010 by Cape Cod Chapter HLAA Blog.

Sometimes we take our hearing aids for granted and forget what it’s like without them.  Here are some actual stories we’ve heard lately to get you thinking about what would happen if you were in a situation without your hearing aids.  How can you let people know how much you need them (other than tattooing  “please face me, I lipread” on your forehead.)

–Before an MRI, your hearing aids are taken away.  Then the attendant talks to you through a microphone when you are inside the machine and you have no idea what he’s saying.

–You are about to have minor surgery.  You wait in the pre-op room for over an hour and don’t get taken.  You discover they have called your name and you didn’t hear them, so they thought you went home.

–You collapse at home (without your hearing aids on) and the rescue squad comes to get you.  They decide that you have Alzheimer’s because you don’t respond to their questioning while their backs are turned.   Luckily your family arrives and asks where your hearing aids are.

You will have to do some advanced planning to avoid these situations, but what to do?

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5. February 2010 by Cape Cod Chapter HLAA Blog.

NAD, NFL, and CBS Collaborate to Increase Captioned Super Bowl Commercials

The National Association of the Deaf (NAD) and the National Football League (NFL) along with CBS Corporation, the network airing Super Bowl XLIV on February 7, 2010, have collaborated to make advertisers who purchase Super Bowl commercials aware of the importance of captioning their content. As a result of these efforts, viewers should notice an increased number of captioned commercials compared to previous Super Bowls. The NAD thanks the NFL and CBS Corporation for their efforts to promote closed captioning of the television commercials.

Working alongside with the NAD and the NFL, CBS encouraged all of their Super Bowl advertisers to close caption their commercials. The NAD appreciates the efforts of the NFL and CBS on this important issue for the deaf and hard of hearing community. The NAD will monitor the results as we pursue a fully captioned experience from start to finish for all future Super Bowls.

The Super Bowl experience includes not only the exciting battle between two football conference champions, but also groundbreaking creative ads which have become a cultural phenomenon. While the Super Bowl game has been captioned for years, the commercials have remained less accessible. With the help of the NFL, the percentage of Super Bowl commercials captioned in last year’s Super Bowl showed a significant improvement. The deaf and hard of hearing community has engaged in an annual ritual of counting the number of captioned advertisements during the Super Bowl.
–
The National Association of the Deaf
8630 Fenton Street, Suite 820
Silver Spring, MD 20910-3819
United States

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7. December 2009 by Cape Cod Chapter HLAA Blog.

Dr. Theresa Cullen announced that The Cape Cod Hearing Center and Siemens Hearing Aids will provide CART at our January, March and May meetings, approximately $1500.  CART is vital for all meeting attendees to understand the proceedings of our meetings and we are very grateful for this generous donation.

See the Cape Cod Hearing Center’s website for information on hearing loss and assistive devices available for those with hearing loss.

http://www.capehearing.com/ 

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4. November 2009 by Cape Cod Chapter HLAA Blog.

MCDHH Commissioner Heidi Reed gave an informative presentation at the Fall meeting of the HLACC. The agency, part of the Mass. Dept. of Health and Human Services has a very useful website at http://www.mass.gov/mcdh where two popular publications can be downloaded from the PUBLICATIONS menu on the right hand side: The Savvy Consumer’s Guide to Hearing Loss by Karen Rockow, and the MCDHH Resource Directory which connects state residents with over 600 agencies, educational programs, organizations and service providers.

Having the publications online is one way the agency has creatively dealt with budget cuts. In fy ‘09, in the Southeast Region, one case manager and one children’s specialist served 89 aduclts and 229 children, with 34 people on the waiting list.

The agency has collaborated with the Department of Public Health/ Early intervention for newborns, the Jury Commission, the Elementary and Secondary Education office to standardize qualifications for interpreters and provide training, the 911 Commission Equipment Distribution Program, which supported legislation to bring the captioned telephone to Massachusetts.

She warned that 9C budget cuts were looming. The meeting was well attended with many questions following the presentation.

UPDATE 10/30/09:

Impact of 9C Budget Cuts

As you know, Governor Patrick has taken action to close a $600 million gap in the state budget, and has announced that he will protect funding for core programs that keep our Commonwealth strong over the long-term. The Governor made tough decisions in order to preserve safety net programs for the most vulnerable. EOHHS received $81.9 million in cuts. MCDHH received a total of $343,500 in cuts. This figure is 6% of our operating budget.

These budget cuts will impact MCDHH as follows:

–The After Hours Emergency Referral Service will no longer be funded.

–DHILS contracts will be reduced.

–Purchase of freelance interpreter and CART services will be reduced.

The DHILS providers whose funding will be reduced include DEAF, Inc., The Center for Living and Working (CLW), and Stavros.

MCDHH will immediately begin implementing a transition plan for the After Hours Emergency Referral service. We have informed the Massachusetts Hospital Association of the option for hospitals to purchase the service from MCDHH. And as another option, hospitals may wish to arrange their own plans by working directly with freelance interpreters. MCDHH will be able to provide technical assistance including a listing of qualified interpreters.

Legislators are asking about the impact of these cuts, so please do contact your legislator to give your input and reaction to these budget cutbacks.

Additional information including plans for informational meetings will be shared with you during the coming week. Thank you for your continued support, our working together is very important during this time of economic difficulty.

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26. September 2009 by Cape Cod Chapter HLAA Blog.

 Text of HB 3598 http://www.mass.gov/legis/bills/house/186/ht03/ht03598.htm

Nini Silver of the Disability Policy Consortium invites the hearing impaired community to meetings to prepare for Beacon Hill testimony on November 10 on these bills:

Rep. Sean Garballey filed House Bill 910. If passed, the bill would cover one hearing aid per hearing impaired ear up to $1,600 every three years (with an option for the insured to pay the difference in cost for a higher-priced aid).

There will be a hearing on November 10th at the State House.  Room and time to be announced. A group of folks will be meeting at the DPC office to prepare for the hearing. We will meet on October 1st 6-8PM and November 5th 6-8PM.  CART is confirmed and interpreters have been requested.  I hope you can join us.  A copy of the current bill is attached.
Also, FYI, MASHA is in full support of this bill.  I will be attending their meeting on October 8th to talk to them in depth about the bill.  We already have a large group of supporters.

If you have any questions or would like further information, please do not hesitate to contact me.
Nini Silver
Community Organizer
Disability Policy Consortium       email:  nsilver@dpcma.org

Additional comment on HB910 by Dr.Brian J. Fligor, Sc.D., CCC-A
“As I am sure many of you on this list know, one key ingredient to getting the audiology community behind legislation that mandates coverage for hearing aids and related services in the option to allow for “balance billing” when the device and services will exceed the benefit amount. Putting a cap on the benefit, without the option of balance billing, would tie the hands of the dispensing professional to allow the insured to access higher level technology when needed. As well, within a few years, this $1600 will likely be less of a benefit than it is now, given everything costs more over time due to inflation. Making this a benefit toward the cost of the device and services and allow for balance-billing would at least make this relevant legislation in 10 years.

To my knowledge, Rep. Garballey has confirmed to Lisa Adams (lcadams56@hotmail.com), who is the organizer of Mass.HAFCC – a (primarily) parent group with the mission to have passed legislation requiring insurance companies to cover the cost of the device and professional services for children needing hearing aids. that an amendment is in HB 910 to confirm this important option.”

Brian J. Fligor, Sc.D., CCC-A

Director of Diagnostic Audiology

Children’s Hospital Boston

Instructor in Otology and Laryngology, Harvard Medical School

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21. September 2009 by Cape Cod Chapter HLAA Blog.

Here is the Fall Newsletter, in which we talk about upcoming events and encourage people to join us and volunteer. Fall newsletter HLA/CC

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12. September 2009 by Cape Cod Chapter HLAA Blog.

Make friends and get satisfaction for a job well done.  We are looking for a Board Secretary to take minutes of the meetings, a social committee chair and members, and publicity committee chair and members.  No experience necessary, just a willingness to help our group be the best it can be.

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8. July 2009 by Cape Cod Chapter HLAA Blog.

We are an official chapter of the Hearing Loss Association, headquartered in Washington D.C. Please contact us through the blog if you have questions.

Helpful websites– Hearing Loss Association–hearingloss.org—Hearing Loss Association

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