Huey Lewis Hearing Loss

If I had to pick a song title to describe hearing loss associated tinnitus, it would be Huey Lewis’ Stuck With You. The song might not be a fit, but the title definitely is. Huey Lewis might even agree, as he is one of several prominent musicians to suffer from both hearing loss and chronic tinnitus.

A Sad Thought

Huey Lewis has brought a lot of joy to people. Songs like Workin’ for a Livin’, (She’s) Some Kind of Wonderful, and Back to the Future’s Back In Time are justifiably considered classics. So there’s a genuine sense of loss and frustration as one realizes that this talented, capable front man for Huey Lewis and the News has lost a significant portion of his hearing. For someone like Huey Lewis hearing loss has to be an utterly infuriating condition.

One symptom he has discussed in relation to his hearing loss is that he has developed tinnitus as well. Tinnitus is a ringing in the ears with no active external cause. It can develop as a result of long exposure to loud sounds. Even a single concert can cause damage to the ears that takes years to manifest as tinnitus. There are very few treatments for it, unfortunately.

An Ounce of Prevention

Fortunately, to Huey Lewis hearing loss presented a challenge rather than simply an unbearable condition. He is a supporter of HEAR: Hearing Education and Awareness for Rockers. This organization seeks to educate people in the music community, both performers and audience members, about the potential risks caused by exposure to loud music. They also promote access to hearing aids and other relief devices to alleviate suffering caused by hearing related ailments.

Saves A Pound of (no) Cure

The case of Huey Lewis hearing loss and tinnitus is a symbol of how artists put their health at risk for the sake of the art and their fans. It’s a humbling thought when someone is injured, in any way, in an attempt to make other people happy. It isn’t, or at least shouldn’t be, any less inspiring that Huey Lewis and other musicians have done so through their performances. What happened to them can’t be treated, their hearing is effectively gone in many cases. This is absolutely the opposite of cool, and should be something that everyone seeking a musical career considers carefully.

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20Q: Hearing Loss and Dementia - Association, Link or Causation?

1. I think I pretty much know what dementia is, but what is your definition? ‘Dementia’ describes a set of symptoms that include memory problems, language problems, personality changes or thinking difficulties. More than one hundred types of dementia have been identified. The most common type is Alzheimer’s dementia. The cause of dementia is damage to the brain due to disease (in the case of Alzheimer’s dementia) or a series of strokes (in the case of vascular dementia). Dementia is a progressive degenerative disease, which means that a person with dementia has more and more difficulty with memory, understanding and communication over time.

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20Q: Hearing Loss and Dementia - Association, Link or Causation?

1. I think I pretty much know what dementia is, but what is your definition? ‘Dementia’ describes a set of symptoms that include memory problems, language problems, personality changes or thinking difficulties. More than one hundred types of dementia have been identified. The most common type is Alzheimer’s dementia. The cause of dementia is damage to the brain due to disease (in the case of Alzheimer’s dementia) or a series of strokes (in the case of vascular dementia). Dementia is a progressive degenerative disease, which means that a person with dementia has more and more difficulty with memory, understanding and communication over time.

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20Q: Hearing Loss and Dementia - Association, Link or Causation?

1. I think I pretty much know what dementia is, but what is your definition? ‘Dementia’ describes a set of symptoms that include memory problems, language problems, personality changes or thinking difficulties. More than one hundred types of dementia have been identified. The most common type is Alzheimer’s dementia. The cause of dementia is damage to the brain due to disease (in the case of Alzheimer’s dementia) or a series of strokes (in the case of vascular dementia). Dementia is a progressive degenerative disease, which means that a person with dementia has more and more difficulty with memory, understanding and communication over time.

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The Impact of Contrastive Stress on Vowel Acoustics and Intelligibility in Dysarthria

Purpose

To compare vowel acoustics and intelligibility in words produced with and without contrastive stress by speakers with spastic (mixed-spastic) dysarthria secondary to cerebral palsy (DYS_CP) and healthy controls (HCs).

Method

Fifteen participants (9 men, 6 women; age M = 42 years) with DYS_CP and 15 HCs (9 men, 6 women; age M = 36 years) produced sentences containing target words with and without contrastive stress. Forty-five healthy listeners (age M = 25 years) completed a vowel identification task of DYS_CP productions. Vowel acoustics were compared across stress conditions and groups using 1st (F1) and 2nd (F2) formant measures. Perceptual intelligibility was compared across stress conditions and dysarthria severity.

Results

F1 and F2 significantly increased in stressed words for both groups, although the degree of change differed. Mean Euclidian distance between vowels also increased with stress. The relative probability of vowels falling within the target F1 × F2 space was greater for HCs but did not differ with stress. Stress production resulted in greater listener vowel identification accuracy for speakers with mild dysarthria.

Conclusions

Contrastive stress affected vowel formants for both groups. Perceptual results suggest that some speakers with dysarthria may benefit from a contrastive stress strategy to improve vowel intelligibility.

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Characterization of Vocal Fold Vibration in Sulcus Vocalis Using High-Speed Digital Imaging

Purpose

The aim of the present study was to qualitatively and quantitatively characterize vocal fold vibrations in sulcus vocalis by high-speed digital imaging (HSDI) and to clarify the correlations between HSDI-derived parameters and traditional vocal parameters.

Method

HSDI was performed in 20 vocally healthy subjects (8 men and 12 women) and 41 patients with sulcus vocalis (33 men and 8 women). Then HSDI data were evaluated by assessing the visual–perceptual rating, digital kymography, and glottal area waveform.

Results

Patients with sulcus vocalis frequently had spindle-shaped glottal gaps and a decreased mucosal wave. Compared with the control group, the sulcus vocalis group showed higher open quotient as well as a shorter duration of the visible mucosal wave, a smaller speed index, and a smaller glottal area difference index ([maximal glottal area – minimal glottal area]/maximal glottal area). These parameters deteriorated in order of the control group and Type I, II, and III sulcus vocalis. There were no gender-related differences. Strong correlations were noted between the open quotient and the type of sulcus vocalis.

Conclusions

HSDI was an effective method for documenting the characteristics of vocal fold vibrations in patients with sulcus vocalis and estimating the severity of dysphonia.

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A Clinical Evaluation of the Competing Sources of Input Hypothesis

Purpose

Our purpose was to test the competing sources of input (CSI) hypothesis by evaluating an intervention based on its principles. This hypothesis proposes that children's use of main verbs without tense is the result of their treating certain sentence types in the input (e.g., Was she laughing ?) as models for declaratives (e.g., She laughing).

Method

Twenty preschoolers with specific language impairment were randomly assigned to receive either a CSI-based intervention or a more traditional intervention that lacked the novel CSI features. The auxiliary is and the third-person singular suffix –s were directly treated over a 16-week period. Past tense –ed was monitored as a control.

Results

The CSI-based group exhibited greater improvements in use of is than did the traditional group (d = 1.31), providing strong support for the CSI hypothesis. There were no significant between-groups differences in the production of the third-person singular suffix –s or the control (–ed), however.

Conclusions

The group differences in the effects on the 2 treated morphemes may be due to differences in their distribution in interrogatives and declaratives (e.g., Is he hiding/He is hiding vs. Does he hide/He hide s ). Refinements in the intervention could address this issue and lead to more general effects across morphemes.

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