September 11, 2015

John V. Brigande, Ph.D., associate professor of otolaryngology, OHSU School of Medicine, talked with the New Scientist about his research into congenital hearing loss and his personal experience with hearing impairment: 

By the time he started graduate research, also at Boston College, the budding developmental biologist had lost much of his hearing in his left ear, but he was able to get by thanks to the amplified sounds emitted by a hearing aid he wore in his right ear. Over the next several years, as the hearing in his right ear waned as well, he elected to focus his research on the auditory system, studying chick and mouse inner ears. In addition to relating to his own experience as a hearing-impaired person, he figured this line of research would engage him with a group of researchers likely to be attuned to his condition. "That would be the best group for me to think about my developmental questions, but also for me to communicate with," he says.

Read Hearing Help at the New Scientist

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