Four-Year-Old鈥檚 Hearing Loss Discovered After Mask Mandate Leads to Help for Boy in Honduras
Ruby Ganci and her family, along with 嘿嘿视频, are raising money for hearing aids to help other children with hearing loss.
Photo courtesy of the Ganci family
For almost 48 million Americans who experience mild to severe hearing loss, communicating with others wearing facemasks presents new challenges.
The family of a 4-year-old girl from Port Washington, New York, who has hearing loss is raising awareness and funds to help children with hearing impairments. With the help from 嘿嘿视频 Health and Phonak, a global provider of hearing solutions, Nathan, a 6-year-old from Honduras, will get new hearing aids.
Ruby Ganci鈥檚 parents discovered their daughter鈥檚 hearing loss at the very beginning of the pandemic. 鈥淎s everyone started putting masks on she would say things like, 鈥楳ove your mask. I can鈥檛 hear what you鈥檙e saying,鈥欌 says Lindsay Ganci, Ruby鈥檚 mother. Ruby got hearing aids last May after visiting Catherine M. Flynn, AUD, an audiologist at 嘿嘿视频 Health practicing at the Cochlear Implant Center鈥擶oodbury and a clinical assistant professor in the .
鈥淚n interactions in which hard of hearing people rely on speech reading and facial cues, masks make communication nearly impossible,鈥 says Dr. Flynn. 鈥淎round the beginning of the pandemic, I noticed an uptick in patients coming in with concerns about their hearing. People with mild hearing loss, who weren鈥檛 previously using hearing aids, suddenly found that they couldn鈥檛 understand speech without them.鈥
Signs that your child may have a hearing impairment include not responding when called, and turning up the volume on the TV or other devices, Dr. Flynn tells CBS New York.
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