Overview

This short course on audiological rehabilitation is for anyone working with adults with acquired hearing loss.

You can attend one, two or three days.

The course will help you to:

• gain insight into people's experience of deafness
• learn about interventions which can improve their quality of life
• work with people with hearing loss more effectively, both individually and in groups

You'll hear from experts in the field, and be offered a holistic view that allows you to draw on expertise from beyond the boundaries of audiology to consider the wider needs of the people you work with.

You'll learn about recent evidence from a variety of clinically relevant sources - this should be of particular interest to those specialising in aural rehabilitation or who wish to take on more responsibility in this area. 

Who this course is for

The course is suitable for:

• audiologists
• hearing therapists
• hearing aid dispensers
• ENT staff (doctors and nurses)
• social workers involved with sensory impairment
• lip reading teachers
• people who work for charities that support people with hearing loss

Course content and structure

You can choose to attend one, two or three days.

Topics covered each day will include the following:

• How to use motivational interviewing to encourage behaviour change (day 1)
• How you can use groups, classes and peer support to benefit people with hearing loss (day 2)
• Making your service accessible to an ageing population (day 3)
• Getting more out of alternative aids to communication (day 3)

The focus of this course is on supporting adults with acquired hearing loss (rather than people who are born Deaf and use sign language). The needs of the former are quite different as they're people who have grown up hearing and who need to adjust to a world in which communication is challenging. 

This course is also unusual in that it focuses entirely on forms of rehabilitation other than hearing aids or cochlear implants. 

Teaching and certificates 

You'll be expected to do some reading in advance of the course.

The course involves a mixture of lectures, discussions and interactive workshops. 

The lectures will present both research evidence and personal accounts.

In interactive sessions you'll:

• discuss topics from the lectures 
• share your own experiences
• evaluate journal articles
• watch video clips and take part in discussion forums with service users
• take part in group activities and role play

At the end of the course you'll receive a certificate of attendance.

Learning outcomes

By the end of this course you should be able to:

• support people with hearing loss in making appropriate behaviour changes in their everyday lives
• evaluate different approaches to aural rehabilitation and make decisions about which are suitable for development in your workplace
• use a collaborative, problem-solving approach when discussing the difficulties experienced by people with hearing loss
• make adaptations to your services so they're more accessible to older people and people with dementia

Eligibility

No technical knowledge or audiological training is required in order to take the course.

You should have some experience of working with adults with hearing loss.

Costs

The fees are:

• £255 - 1 day
• £295 - 2 days
• £435 - 3 days

Course team

Lucy Handscomb - Course Director

Lucy is a lecturer at the UCL Ear Institute. She's a hearing therapist and teaches psychosocial aspects of deafness, rehabilitation skills and counselling to audiology students.

Sarah Bent

Sarah is an audiological scientist at Wrexham Maelor Hospital, Wales. She works with adults with hearing loss and runs a specialist hearing clinic for people with dementia.

Dr Paul Chadwick

Paul is a senior teaching fellow at UCL's Centre for Behaviour Change.

Andrew Goodwin

Andrew is a profoundly deaf cochlear implant user. He works as Hearing Loss Outreach Manager at the Jewish Deaf Association.

Course information last modified: 1 Nov 2021, 13:29