Listen Carefully: Why Access to Hearing Healthcare Matters

World Hearing Day is observed every year on March 3. This year, to mark this important occasion, Dave sat down for an extended conversation with Dr. Sara Burdak, Starkey’s Chief Audiology Officer, and Michael Scholl, Starkey’s Executive Vice President of Corporate Relations. They discuss a wide range of topics related to the importance of better hearing, including the startling projection by the World Health Organization that upwards of 700 million people by 2050 will have a disabling degree of hearing loss. For this year’s World Hearing Day theme, the WHO put special emphasis on highlighting the importance of integrating hearing care into overall healthcare, and specifically within primary care. The Starkey panel talks about all of that and much more in this special edition of Starkey Sound Bites.

Link to Episode Transcript

Transcript

SPEAKER_03 0:01

Welcome to a very special edition of Starkey Soundbites. I'm your host, Dave Fabri, Starkey's Chief Innovation Officer. In celebration of World Hearing Day, I wanted to bring you a conversation that I had with Dr. Sarah Burdack, Starkey's Chief Audiology Officer, and Michael Scholl, our Chief Compliance Officer. The interview was recorded in our studio and first streamed online with the goal of highlighting the importance of bringing ear and hearing care into primary care. We covered a lot of ground and we had a lot of fun, and I hope you'll enjoy it because we wanted to bring it to you, our loyal podcast listeners. I hope you enjoy. I'm Dave Fabry, Starkey's Chief Innovation Officer, and I'm here with two special guests for a discussion on the theme of the day. Dr. Sarah Burdack is Starkey's Chief Audiology Officer, and Michael Scholl is the executive vice president of corporate relations. Welcome to both of you.

SPEAKER_00 1:10

Thanks so much for having us here. I'm really excited about this topic.

SPEAKER_03 1:14

Yeah, me too. I mean, the the issue, and I know I'm preaching to the choir for many of you who are listening today, but hearing is a sense that is often underappreciated until it's lost. And in many cases, people don't fully understand how important it is that hearing connects us to other individuals. The theme this year for the World Hearing Day is uh ear and hearing care for all. Let's make it a reality. And I think that raising awareness and then the accessibility, access, and things that we'll talk about in the next 45 minutes or so are all related to really raising awareness for the importance of healthy hearing. So uh, you know, the statistics that the World Health Organization provides us with suggest that today there's about 466 million people worldwide with what they consider to be a disabling degree of hearing loss. And that number is projected to go up substantially in the coming years. They estimate that upwards of 700 million people by 2050 will have a disabling degree of hearing loss, and over a billion people will have some measure of hearing loss. I think this year's theme is so important first for you and your team, Sarah, because as our chief audiology officer, you and your team are focused on uh providing global hearing health care. And do you want to talk a little bit about your role and how it is that your team is working so hard to bring better hearing around the world?

SPEAKER_00 2:46

Yeah, I'd love to because it's something I'm certainly passionate about, as you know, and I've been in this profession for many, many years. And as our global audiology strategy continues to evolve, specifically, we look at what we're doing from the global education and training space, how we're completing that circle with our clinical team, because we need to make sure that we're always delivering the best products, the best services. Um, but importantly, the work that the team does is with the Department of Veterans Affairs. And the reason that that's also so impactful is because when you look at the veterans today, the number one and two top service-related injuries are tinnitus and hearing loss. And when we look at that scale of veterans being fit, there's 3.6 million that are wearing hearing technology. And one of the great privileges that I think in working with the VA is that we're able to then collaborate with their audiologists and make sure veterans always get our top technology. And in my roles too, you know, I'm passionate about students in audiology, making sure that, again, they're equipped with all of the tools, everything that they need to be prepared to step out from the crowd to help educate on this very, very important topic. And that leads into what we do in our product development. Um, we have the luxury, you and I both, of continuing to work with patients regularly, work with hearing healthcare professionals regularly. So that helps us always be connected to what we want to be doing in the future as well, so that we can continue to pave the way for groundbreaking technology because we do absolutely know hearing is essential. And everybody here at Starkey fully believes that to hear better means you're living a better and more meaningful life.

SPEAKER_03 5:01

Indeed. And I and I think, you know, it it goes without saying that while we're a US-based company, we do business in over a hundred countries around the world on six continents. I think, to my knowledge, we don't have any representation in Antarctica yet. But uh that global focus really requires a global team. And you and your team, as you as you allude, um have trainers and representatives, audiologists who are providing that training initiative around the world. And that effort, I think, uh, can't simply be a US company then distributing to the world, but rather with the focus in each of those areas, because hearing loss around the world has different uh uh initiatives in different parts of the of the world where there are uh uh healthcare contracts that provide hearing aids uh in their healthcare system, and then as in other markets, and we'll get to this a little bit with you, Michael, um, with uh some of the changes that we've seen in U.S. policy for the creation of over-the-counter uh uh care. I mean, it really is a global effort and one that that can't be uh underestimated in terms of the enormity of the responsibility to deliver outstanding outcomes around the world.

SPEAKER_00 6:15

Yeah, I agree. We train thousands of hearing health care professionals on an annual basis so that they can go out and do their job effectively. And one of those is again to make sure that they're reaching out in the communities that they serve because education is a massive piece of what it is that we're trying to do.

SPEAKER_03 6:38

Indeed. Well, I think, Michael, let's uh bring you into the conversation here. Uh, this year's theme for World Hearing Day holds a special place in your heart, I know, um, as uh working with Special Olympics. Uh talk a little bit about uh some of the exciting things that have happened in the past year and some of the goals moving forward for uh this partnership that Starkey has with uh Special Olympics International.

SPEAKER_02 7:04

Yes, thank you, Dave. That's that's a great question. When we think about who Starkey is, who we are at the core, it's about giving back. And this year's theme for World Hearing Day, ear and hearing care for all, let's make it a reality. Um, our partnership with Special Olympics International is a perfect example of what uh you know, what that means to us at Starkey. And Dave and Sarah, as you both know, you know, the partnership that we've entered into with Special Olympics over the last 12 months has allowed us to travel to their games in the United States. We're going to Berlin for the international, the World Games later this year. And at these games, we have an opportunity to help those individuals, those Special Olympians with intellectual disabilities. We have the opportunity to bring hearing health, to bring our technology to them. And, you know, Dave, you know, as as we've talked about, right, there are tens of thousands of Olympians across the globe. 88% of those Olympians have never had a hearing test.

SPEAKER_03 8:08

That statistic is just staggering to me. I think the number is 30,000 Special Olympians say that they have some difficulty with hearing. And when we talk about for all raising awareness for the importance of getting those individuals who have hearing loss, regardless of where they live in the world, uh, it's important.

SPEAKER_02 8:26

And that's what's so great about our partnership with Special Olympics, right? Um, as part of our Starkey Cares program, which is our corporate social responsibility program, right? One of those initiatives is to support what we call our neighbors in need. Whether those people are here in Minnesota, whether they're somewhere else across the U.S., or whether they're in another country across the globe, um, if you're somebody who needs the help, our Starkey Cares program is there to support you. And one of those partnerships is with Special Olympians. And Dave, not only are we helping Special Olympians at their events, right, at their games, but the great thing about this partnership, if there is a Special Olympian anywhere in the world, Special Olympics identifies that they might have a hearing loss, they let us know, and then we find our partners globally to support that athlete. So when Special Olympics talks about an inclusion revolution, when World Hearing Day is about, you know, ear and you know, care for all, we are making that a reality as part of our partnership with Special Olympics and as part of who we are with our Starkey Cares program.

SPEAKER_03 9:35

Yeah, I think the issue that you raise, and and I can't I can't say how much I have gotten back uh from the partnership. I mean, you put in effort to go and participate in Orlando or Michigan as we've done, and I'm really excited about Berlin, but what I've gotten back from the experience has far uh exceeded what I've put in uh for me personally. And as an audiologist, it's something that still uh really makes me smile when I think about some of the memories we've created.

SPEAKER_02 10:04

Well, and in the stories that you see from these games, right? I mean, we help them maybe on the first day of the games, and then they're at their event is on day four, and you know, they're catching a touchdown pass, and for the first time, they're hearing the congratulatory remarks from the coach or the you know the applause from the crowd. I mean, that that makes a mark on all of us, right? And that's truly why we're here to help people hear better and live better.

SPEAKER_03 10:26

Yeah, and you know, I I I want to park this for a minute because now I want to go back to Sarah with a with a question. But the the point you raise is so important is that when we go to the Special Olympics events, it's not just the distribution of the product, but that connection with the community uh worker who lives near their home, regardless of where they are in the world, because it is that combination of the technology and the professional who's going to ensure optimal outcomes occur. And we'll come back to that because I think it has an impact on over-the-counter hearing aids as well. And we'll come back to that in a minute. Um, Sarah, uh as you mentioned, this uh the World Hearing Day theme this year highlights the importance of integrating hearing care into overall health care and specifically within primary care as we know it in the U.S. Um, as an essential component, as you mentioned, of healthcare coverage in general. What can hearing care providers do to educate their local primary care physicians and nurse practitioners who are seeing individuals, aging individuals as they begin to uh experience some hearing loss? What can what can uh the professionals listening to this session do to interface with those uh primary care physicians?

SPEAKER_00 11:46

Yeah, thank you. I think that's another great question. And also is community-based. For sure. Because I think it's broader than even the local healthcare community, but I strongly feel hearing healthcare professionals need to be a part of that medical profile.

SPEAKER_03 12:02

For sure.

SPEAKER_00 12:02

And sometimes that means they have to work their way into it. And one of the things that I look at from raising awareness is what are the community events in your area? And it starts at the professional level, but it also starts at the patient and family level. So there are things even from doing lunch and learn events, and that's something that Starkey has a starter kit for to do lunch and learns, to again educate on the impact of untreated hearing loss, which can be significant, what you can do about it. A lot of times we're in situations when we're out and about and people ask me, I wouldn't even know where to go for that service. Or go to Google. Google it. How many times, though, then are you talking about hearing technology and people have an old stigma and they're apprehensive to take action? So all of that education, whether you're going to a community center, I strongly encourage professionals to be at health fairs, at senior centers, and really work their way into that primary healthcare community so that again, they're raising awareness of what the impacts of untreated hearing loss are, what somebody can do about it, and where to go to take action. People are waiting far too long to do that, and there's no reason that we continue to have this dated perception or stigma of hearing technology. It doesn't exist today.

SPEAKER_02 13:44

And if I might, you know, Sarah, you're exactly right, kind of from the from the ground up in the community and having those conversations. The other thing that we are actually doing kind of from the top down, and Dave, you've you've participated in some of these conversations, but uh within within uh you know government and HHS, there's the U.S. Preventative Services Task Force, right? So this is an organization that um they encourage physicians to talk about certain things with their patients, right? And we're having conversations that these primary care physicians should be talking about hearing loss and hearing health more than they're currently doing, right? And if we get, if we get some of these government agencies continue to educate them and encourage primary care physicians to talk about this, right? Not only do you get it at the community level, but you know, the the physicians are better educated and better trained to deal with individuals who might have a hearing loss.

SPEAKER_03 14:36

That's such a great point. And I want to dive a little deeper with both of you into that. I mean, first of all, according to the World Health Organization, uh ear and hearing problems are among the most common ones encountered in the community by people of all ages, and certainly with that aging population, over 60% of these can be identified and addressed at the primary care level. The primary care physician still serves as that gatekeeper, that trusted provider for many people as they're going through these gates. And despite the fact that we've seen stigma go away in the emerging generation of boomers, it's still somewhat there. And in many cases, their query to the primary care physician is met with a response that is my least favorite one in healthcare, and that is your hearing is normal for your age. And Michael, you raised the issue of the U.S. preventative health or preventative service task force. Um, you know, they updated their guidelines for screening for hearing in 2021. The last time they had addressed this was in 2012. And disappointingly, for those of us in this space, they didn't recommend that individuals age 50 and above have hearing screening. And of course, like I said, that was a disappointment to those of us who want to see raised awareness, getting that baseline screening. I think the difference from 10 years ago was they did acknowledge the impact of untreated hearing loss on social isolation, depression, possibly even cognitive decline. But, you know, we need to get in those discussions because the primary care physicians do listen to what that preventative test was.

SPEAKER_02 16:21

And as both of you know, right, the research continues to evolve, right? We get studies daily that show the importance of getting the screening at an earlier age. So, you know, even though they did update it, maybe they may not have updated it to where we wanted them to go, we are making progress. We are having conversations, and we will get to a point where screening will be a routine part of that exam at 50, 55, 60 at those at those ages.

SPEAKER_00 16:44

Well, and if you look at that expectation, and the more we can talk about this and have these discussions, we want even at the the level of the patient for them to be asking for these screenings because it should become standard protocol, similar to vision, similar to what we're doing from a dental plan, sure, where this becomes an annual part of healthcare.

SPEAKER_03 17:10

Yeah. And and you know, that that issue is, I think, magnified by also uh more reports coming out of the World Health Organization with um the National Institutes of Health and WHO have reported that uh nearly 80% of people with insufficient or poor hearing experience at least one additional chronic health condition. So hearing is not an isolated condition that people simply have a little bit of hearing loss and isn't connected into their overall health. That statistic alone is staggering. And I think the comorbidity piece, uh certainly one we've heard about a lot, is cognition. But there are also many other health conditions that have comorbidity with hearing loss. And Sarah, maybe you'd talk a little bit about that.

SPEAKER_00 17:58

Yeah, I think from many years ago this was all speculation. And now we're seeing annually more and more studies coming out confirming the comorbidities that occur with untreated hearing loss. One of those that I think people tend to really gravitate towards, though, as you mentioned, is the impact of cognitive decline. I think this is really an area that sort of then creates the snowball effect of use it or lose it. And with cognitive decline, with dementia associations with hearing loss, there are because of your vascular changes with hearing, there can also be cardiovascular concerns, diabetes. Um, one of the things that we're focusing on, as well as certainly fall detection and prevention. So there are a number of things there, but I I sometimes think we don't want to be all the doom and gloom because the best message is the studies also show. And with the labset commission, um, and they've been updating um the studies even in 2020, we're saying that hearing loss is really the single most modifiable treat that will help prevent dementia. That's significant because if you can get treated for hearing loss with hearing aids, we are showing that anybody who has a hearing loss that is treated effectively within three years' time of that loss performs at normal levels. And I think that's pretty incredible. So we can say that yes, untreated hearing loss is associated with a 50% increase in dementia. We know that mild um cases are you know about double, um, moderate cases are triple. But if you have a severe hearing loss that's up to five times, um, you're up to five times more likely to have an impact um with dementia. So I can't stress enough. We hear too often people are waiting, you know, seven to ten years to do something about it. I have people in my own life who have waited that amount of time. We have to take action. We have to get people to get the hearing help they need as quickly as they possibly can.

SPEAKER_02 20:38

Well, and I I'm, you know, I'm fortunate enough to serve on the board of directors for the Alzheimer's Association, right? And again, you know, Starkey taking a leadership role, you know, the caregiver is so important, right? So, how do we, how do we educate the caregiver that that this is there is this important connection, this comorbidity with hearing loss, right? We're having conversations on how do we educate our hearing professionals across the country so they know what to look for when they're seeing patients in their clinic. So uh the Alzheimer's Association, they certainly understand and deter, you know, and see the connection between hearing loss, dementia, cognitive decline, and Alzheimer's. So, you know, Starkey, we're trying to partner with them so we can better educate the whole, you know, ecosystem and of folks, caregivers, individuals, et cetera. So um this is certainly another topic that's near and dear to my heart. And I think there's a lot of opportunity over the next couple of years with the studies that come out for us to make you know tremendous inroads into that population.

SPEAKER_00 21:36

Well, it is a medical condition. And I think so often people think, oh, I'll just turn up the volume or everyone else's mumbling. I love that you brought up the caregiver because you're you see that oftentimes they're the ones who are the most significantly impacted by someone's hearing loss in their life. And with them understanding all of of these comorbidities as well, they're likely to help get somebody to take action too.

SPEAKER_02 22:05

And and the two of you know better than the than I do, but the that our technology, right? When we think about overall health and wellness, you know, we have the best technology to deal with some of those comorbidities. So we're in an exciting, I think we're in a you know a fabulous spot, you know, to help folks with our technology. Well yeah.

SPEAKER_03 22:22

And I think Sarah, you raised the important point. We've used the stick for many years at uh highlighting the threat of untreated hearing loss. The carrot, you know, we've been on a five year journey now to try to change attitudes about hearing aids as a single purpose device, importantly to provide better hearing, but also to enable that uh tracking of health and wellness and connection uh to other features that make it a cool factor. And we've seen that impact in the market. And Michael, you're right. I mean um uh cardiologists will often say that hearing is the best indication of overall cardiovascular health in the aging population because up to 80% of people with cardiovascular disease have hearing loss. There's a really high comorbidity there. And and my parents were you know concerned about cardiovascular disease and cancer. Boomers are concerned about cognitive decline. And one of the issues is we we the timing of this year's World Hearing Day theme, I think is so important because we expect to see the early results from the Achieve study, the aging and cognitive health evaluation and elders study, multinational longitudinal study of over a thousand people studied over five years of time to see uh in a in a in a randomized population people that were treated with amplification and hearing solutions versus those who were merely educated, not merely, but those who were provided with other materials to age in place but without the benefit of amplification. We expect to see those results this year and we may see moving from correlation to causation. No one knows yet what the results are going to show. We've certainly seen inklings of that in studies that have been coming out. But I think this comorbidity piece and relating that to primary care physicians is such an important one consistent with the overall theme of World Hearing Day for this year. So let's go to Michael back to you on this and I appreciate both of you discussing and Sarah jump in on this one because I know you have opinions on this final regulations regarding OTC hearing aids and one of the goals with OTC in this new category was to create greater accessibility and affordability to hearing health care. Share with some of the behind the scenes some of that behind the scenes work that you've been doing for five six years on this topic as we've seen this go from the National Academies of Medicine and ECAS committee, the President's Council on Science and Technology into reality.

SPEAKER_02 25:09

And and Dave, we have how much time do we have hours I think we've talked a lot you know kind of up through 2022 when the rule became final but you know it started back with the key PCAS report you know a decade or so ago and then obviously in 2017 there was OTC legislation that moved through uh both the the House and the Senate the president signed it into law and then in uh 2022 three administrations yeah yeah in November of 2022 the the the OTC regulation finally went into effect. I'm not going to go through every you know step along the line but what we did, right, we took the lead as a manufacturer since you know 2015 2016 2017. And really what we were focused on was educating lawmakers, educating policymakers in Washington about our industry because quite frankly prior to that there hadn't been a lot of that going on. Right. And we've had you know hundreds of meetings with you know members their staff folks in different agencies just to educate them about what our industry does what our professionals do what is hearing health care what does our technology do and um we made we made a lot of of you know great impactful progress during those years and the OTC regulation you know obviously it was finalized it went into effect of in November of last year. And look we said all along from the from the very first conversation that I had with a member of Congress on this we're not opposed to greater access. We're not opposed to greater affordability. We want to ensure that the individual that the individual with hearing loss is protected right and that hearing professionals can still continue to help these people right because we believe hearing health care is best served you know by through the hearing professional. So that was our focus um and and I think we really did instruct the FDA and help the FDA discern um you know a policy that that you know we're all following now. Yes we've got a few months you know OTC hearing aids have been on the market for a few months you know I I don't know that there's this tremendous you know uplift in in uh you know sales of OTC hearing aids but what I think's important whenever you have the president of the United States he did this on Tuesday President Biden stood up before the joint chamber right he's talking about hearing health he's talking about hearing aids right whenever we can talk about hearing health and hearing aids and our technology and how we can help people that's a step in the right direction. So what we've tried to do is we've tried to really focus our our conversation with elected officials on here's the best way. We still believe it's through the hearing professional but if we're going to have OTC hearing aids let's make sure the patient is protected. And you know we're seeing a handful of OTC hearing aids on the market. There are a couple of bad actors who are maybe you know making some products available they should not we've seen some state attorneys general crack down on them. But at the end of the day, more access, better affordability, I think it's what we all stand for. And if if an OTC hearing aid gets an individual into a product that they start to see you know a difference and it starts to make a difference for them and then that gets them into seeing a professional and maybe into you know a different technology or as they continue to age, you know, the more we can help people the better. So I'm proud of the work that we done. I know there was this idea that OTC is going to hit the market and it's just going to turn the industry upside down. Well we're three, four months into it and that clearly isn't the case. And I think that's because a lot of the great work that you and Sarah and all of us um at Starkey have done.

SPEAKER_03 28:53

Well I think you you raise such an important point and consistent with World Hearing Day's theme today is hear and hearing care for all anything that closes that gap. In the U.S. only about 37 to 40% of people with hearing loss do something about it. If we can see that lift because of this new category, then great. But with the hearing care, I think we have to we've seen a lot of continued attention last month with the President's State of the Union address uh talking still about uh uh the the the technology and lowering the cost to improve accessibility and affordability but that shouldn't come at the price of accessibility to a professional if they need it and also to ensure that the best outcomes which as you say we have seen year over year are with our technology in the professional's hands to deliver patient delight.

SPEAKER_00 29:46

And Sarah I know you Well that's what I hear so often, Dave is I'm out in the community a lot and my friends and people that I'm surrounded by know what I do for a living. And so often they will say gosh how is that going? Because it seems like something that would be really hard to do over the counter and I think the the general public even realizes that. So they feel they would need the support of a professional or they would want to have that option as both of you said. And the individuals who we've worked with and fit with technology they going through that experience who they've already worn hearing aids or been wearing hearing aids for many years generally they have said I don't know how I would have gotten to this level of hearing how I do without the support of a professional to do it. And so I'm still having a lot of those conversations so it's been interesting. So while I agree all of this helps raise awareness right I generally think people still think hearing is health care and a medical um concern and they're interested in in getting a professional recognition.

SPEAKER_03 31:09

Indeed and this new category creates more competition and that is good. And uh that compet what was the word that President Biden used uh last month exploitation. And I think that was the thing that managed to unite professionals and those working in industry because I don't feel like we're exploiting anybody. We're out there trying to do best for the patient best for the end user and seeing the best outcomes is technology plus a professional's understanding of the unique aspect that people bring with any degree of hearing loss. It's not limited by a mild to moderate degree of hearing loss in my opinion.

SPEAKER_02 31:47

Yeah that's exactly right. And look as as Sarah said as you said the fact that people are talking about this when I talk to uh you know hearing care professionals across the country and I ask them are people coming in and asking for OTC hearing aids people are coming in. Generally they've heard of them or they know of them but it's a conversation starter right and it allows the professional to have the conversation to determine what is the best solution for you and your lifestyle. So um I I think that's a positive for all of us.

SPEAKER_03 32:15

Totally agree. And you know let's let's segue into the next question and that is really related to uh something that you and Starkey's president and CEO Brandon Sawalich uh developed in during the OTC uh discussions of listen carefully but now talk a little bit about now okay we we're through that but does that mean listen carefully is more no that's that's a great I'm glad you bring bring that up you know so listen carefully we created over the last year uh as really a a a one-stop shop for individuals with hearing loss for hearing professionals to learn about what's happening um across the country that might be impacting our industry, right?

SPEAKER_02 32:56

That might be impacting their profession. And and uh you know some of you may recall that uh you know Medicare there was a lot of discussion about Medicare there's a lot of discussion about hearing protection obviously OTC and and insurance coverage et cetera so we created a repository of of anything dealing with with that and um it's still up and running and and Dave I might say it's it's as important now as we've as we've turned the calendar and we're looking at 2023 um the the the amount of legislation that's happening at the state level that impacts our industry is staggering. I have seen in 10 or 11 states Minnesota just uh in the last few weeks where legislation has been introduced requiring um you know the private insurance to cover hearing aid right and there's some licensing legislation that's happening across the country with the OTC regulation um as many of our our our listeners may know right the definition of prescription hearing aid versus a non-prescription hearing aid right some states are dealing with that um we had a we had a a perfect example in Ohio um one of our uh one of the hearing professionals that we work with reached out and said Starkey uh we're seeing legislation that's going to no longer allow uh hearing dispensers to fit prescription hearing aids what did we do well within 48 hours we were on the phone we were talking to the authors of the bill we got it changed that's exactly how listen carefully is supposed to work right we can't be everywhere all the time we can't monitor what's happening but with a super local issue like that right when our hearing professional found out about it they reached out we went to work and you know we've got folks on the ground who are keeping their ear to the ground trying to identify things that might impact our industry and then we're doing it at you know we're doing the same thing trying to communicate with them about what's happening. So uh at the end of the day I think we all know with OTC and other regulations, regulators, elected officials, they impact the work that we do, right? They impact our industry. So again, this trajectory that we've built over the last seven years of trying to work with folks at the federal level, at the state level to educate them, you know, it's only that much more powerful when hearing professionals and patients in their local communities are listening and we work together to really make sure that we're educating and we're directing this legislation so it's best for that the person with hearing loss, so it's best for the hearing professional. And then at the end of the day, you know, that's what matters most.

SPEAKER_03 35:36

Now today's World Hearing Day this is a U.S. initiative only at the at the moment.

SPEAKER_02 35:43

Are there any plans in the future to consider going global with yeah you know the not not really right we've really been focused on on this as a U.S. initiative when you start thinking about individual countries, individual municipalities, it starts to become you know what we have done and I'm again proud of the work that we've done is we have a network right globally of contacts and individuals that we work with as things do come up, right? There's changes as both of you know to the regulatory framework quite frequently in some of these countries and some of these areas. So we have individuals, we have folks that we work with on the ground, but not to the same specificity as we do with Listen Carefully perfect.

SPEAKER_03 36:23

So so those in the US listening to this who want to go to the Listen Carefully website that's listencarefully dot com to com. Yep. And then what about how does someone who's a professional who's listening to this become an ambassador?

SPEAKER_02 36:37

Yeah so our Listen Carefully ambassador program um you know Blaze Delfino who all of us work with um you know he's kind of leading that program and we're trying to identify a handful of ambassadors in all 50 states those are our go-to people right something happens you know we we kind of go to you to kind of lead the charge of what's ever happening in your state and I think we're through uh maybe about 25 states of identifying those ambassadors but if you're listening and if you're interested um you can go to listencarefully dot com and you can sign up to be a listen carefully ambassador because again I can't stress how important it is number one policymakers impact what we do. We are the manufacturer right we work across the country but those of you who live in the state live in your district you you you represent your community and at the end of the day that's who elected officials and policymakers want to hear from right they want to hear from their constituents they want to hear from small business owners and patients in their community so we need ambassadors and from all 50 states to achieve the success that we can with listen carefully.

SPEAKER_00 37:41

Well and I think you've done a remarkable job and that's something that people are recognizing Starkey for as being a great partner but providing the tools that they need to be those ambassadors and advocacy because not everybody knows how to do that or where to go. And we're becoming that organization where people do feel like they've they have um someone that they can reach out to for help.

SPEAKER_03 38:10

And I've been to the hill with both of you and you both of you are very strong uh ambassadors maybe lobbyists on behalf of the industry thanks to what we've had let's um so we've we've talked about how individuals can be involved with listen carefully as an ambassador um I want to go back to primary care physicians and hearing care providers how should uh uhudiologists and hearing instrument specialists uh engage with primary care physicians in the care and treatment of their patients and do you think that's a worthwhile endeavor and if so how should they go about doing that it's absolutely worthwhile and I think again back to getting out in the community but also being part of the overall healthcare system and being viewed as a critical component to that.

SPEAKER_00 39:05

So my recommendation is to always make sure that you're providing a primary care provider with information of the treatment plan you've provided, how it's going, what the status is because that's their patient as well.

SPEAKER_03 39:22

In fact in many cases the primary care physician considers this their patient that is on loan absolutely provider because they're taking care of the entire ecosystem that is the patient.

SPEAKER_00 39:33

So getting that feedback so yeah we shouldn't just leave it there. And then what I always think is anytime you have that capability it keeps that front and center from an overall hearing health care from the technology it gives you again the foot in the door it allows you to ask if you can do a lunch and learn physicians need to be as impressed with the new technology because it's pretty incredible what we're able to do today. So I think sometimes it's really the basics of writing your reports, staying there, staying connected as well as continuing to increase your referral base because that gets to when patients are saying I don't know what to do or where to go, the primary care physicians in their area should know they need to go to you go to this hearing center and you'll get the care that you need. And the other piece that I'm a huge advocate for as you know Dave is this education even at the level of your nose and throat physicians about the importance of two hearing aids about getting fit quickly about you already mentioned that oh you've got normal hearing for your age those are all things that we have to get around that bias as well and make sure at the ground level they're getting the right recommendations to seek treatment.

SPEAKER_03 41:05

Yeah and there and there's no better way for a primary care physician to become aware of the improved technology and services that can be available to their patients than to see the results in a use case that is their patient and to see the impact on their life. So that's an important feedback loop as you say in addition to being an access point to maybe lunch and learns or conversations about what hearing and balance treatment can look like and the referral to a hearing care professional. But that feedback loop to say look how well they're doing is is the best way I think to make an impact and to build those relationships and to focus on hearing as an essential component of overall health care. Now I want to uh uh our time is nearly up here and we just launched uh a new product Genesis AI and we've talked about Michael raised earlier um for five years we've been on this journey to use embedded sensors so that we can monitor physical activity, social engagement fall detection which you talked about Sarah how can number one um hearing care providers maybe share some of those data with primary care physicians and then what does Genesis AI do to better involve healthcare providers outside of our little discipline to be aware of what sorts of things that um simply wearing devices can do to benefit overall uh overall health so you can see I can hardly keep it contained we have to go back to again Dave what are what it's hard to prioritize all of that we do again have a lot of the information on comorbidities relations to untreated hearing loss so certainly anybody can visit starkey.com and get a lot of that information and brochures and information that can go back out again into the community but one of the things that I'm really excited about there's many in Genesis AI is that we have really built this technology from the ground up it is all new everything and when people come in for better hearing that really is what they want so when I think about how we're pushing the boundaries and what we're doing with our neuroprocessing which is really the industry's best technology we are able to automate our systems using AI the most advanced DNN which is deep neural network to have processing that really mimics that of the human brain and yeah if you think about the Holy

SPEAKER_00 44:00

Grail, as I'll say, is always how do we mimic processing as if you had normal hearing? So we're as close to that and industry leading um and setting the standard there. And the other piece that I tend to get um from patients is they really just want things automatic. People don't want to have to be pushing buttons. They we have an amazing app, but that should be something they can use if they want to. So with this technology, we have 80 million adjustments that are automatic every hour. And that translates to this hearing aid is working for you all the time to the tune of 22,000 adjustments every second. So when we look at what our product mission is, it is to provide caring technology that connects people to people.

SPEAKER_01 45:00

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 45:00

And that's really what we accomplish all day, every day here. But that's what's meaningful about Genesis AI.

SPEAKER_03 45:08

Yeah, that's a mouthful. And for those who haven't experienced it yet, I'd encourage you to reach out to your rep or or to look at the website and learn more about this, and then more importantly, see the impact it has on your patient. Now, um, one more thing, we do have some, in addition to the user apps that a patient may use to control their devices, um, hear share is a way that with the patient's permission, they can share data about physical activity, social engagement, whether they're wearing the devices, um, uh, even with the connection between their devices and their phone. For those patients who have a deep relationship with their primary care physician, um, it's not unheard of. And I know of several examples where um patients have shared those types of data with their primary care physician or at least the practice that they're affiliated with, so that they can monitor them on this overall uh health and wellness journey beyond the hearing benefit alone.

SPEAKER_00 46:14

Yeah, I agree. And I love that you mentioned the caregiver space. I think it's an amazing suggestion. Even again, we've talked about the aging population. However, that could be and a senior living, assisted living, all of those uh areas could be where an app like Pearshare could be very, very beneficial.

SPEAKER_03 46:36

Well. Um, we are out of time. And so, Dr. Burdak, Michael Scholl, thank you for sharing your uh expertise and in this conversation today and to our listeners and viewers. Um, I hope that you enjoyed this World Hearing Day broadcast. Um obviously we're quite passionate about this. Uh alone we can't do much, but together we truly can change the world and make a small impact on this World Hearing Day to try to uh meet the objective of this year's theme as well as the ongoing theme to raise awareness for the importance of hearing. So thank you both for being here today for this special program. Thank you, Dave.

SPEAKER_00 47:18

Thank you.

SPEAKER_03 47:24

Well, podcast listeners, I hope that you enjoyed this conversation between Dr. Sarah Burdack, Michael Scholl, and myself. And as we wrap up this episode, a friendly nudge to have you please rate and review us on your preferred podcast platform. And if you enjoyed this session, I would also suggest you share it with your friends, colleagues, and network. While you're at it, why don't you follow us or hit subscribe so that you don't miss a single episode in the future? Also, we'd love to know what's on your mind. What issues concern you? What questions do you have for our experts? Uh future episodes will be uh devoted to answering some of your questions or issues, and all you need to do in order to submit them is send us an email at soundbites at Starkey.com. That's soundbites at Starkey.com. Thank you so much for listening, and we hope to see and hear you again really soon.