Monday, January 28, 2002

HOLLAND -- Hope College professor David G. Myers was gratified by the number of people who turned out Saturday to learn about hearing-assistance technology that can change the lives of those with hearing problems.

About 150 people, representing churches, government, businesses and other institutions, were on hand at Evergreen Commons to learn about "induction loop" technology that allows hearing aids to become in-the-ear loudspeakers. The technology is widely used in other countries wherever public announcement systems are used.

The system was installed late last week in Evergreen Commons, the first looped facility in the city.

"You don't see it -- it's completely invisible," Myers told visitors Saturday.

"I'm very gratified you're meeting the needs for those of us with hearing loss ... because you care about those of us who are (hearing impaired), and you want to make your institutions accessible."

The Community Foundation of Holland-Zeeland is administering a grant program that Myers set up.

Leaders hope to make the area a model community for meeting the needs of those with hearing loss.

Holland Mayor Al McGeehan said the city should be a leader in this area.

The technology is common in the United Kingdom and Scandinavia, where it is used in churches, movie theaters, lecture halls and museums.

It involves looping a wire around a room, and hooking it into a public-address system. The speaker's voice then is transmitted through an electromagnetic field to certain types of hearing aids -- free of distortion and muffling.

Myers, a psychology professor who has written about living with hearing loss, is trying to get churches in Holland and Zeeland to install the technology, and serve as a model for communities across the country.

The technology requires that a person have hearing aids with telecoil, or T-coil, receivers.

The user then only has to turn on a switch in the hearing aid to take advantage of the audio loop system.

In Britain, the government is requiring businesses and organizations that provide verbal information to install the systems by 2004, Myers said. Signs are displayed so that hearing-aid users know the technology is available.

He was worshipping two years ago in the centuries-old Iona Abbey in Scotland when he first experienced the technology. Sounds echoed off the stone walls until he pushed a button on his hearing aids.

It opened him to "a whole world of listening that literally had me almost in tears of joy," he said.