This study sought to determine the effectiveness of telepractice as a method of delivering early intervention services to families of infants and toddlers who are deaf or hard of hearing. A comparison group design was applied to ascertain the child, family, and provider outcomes via telepractice compared with traditional in-person home visits. A total of 48 children and their families, along with 15 providers from 5 early intervention programs, across the country participated. Children in the telepractice group received more intervention, although the number of prescribed sessions was equal across groups. Analyses of covariance demonstrated that children in the telepractice group scored statistically significantly higher than children in the in-person group on the PLS-5 Receptive Language subscale and PLS-5 Total Language standard scores, and the groups scored similarly on other language measures. There were no statistically significant differences between groups in regard to family outcomes of support, knowledge, and community involvement. Analysis of video recordings of telepractice versus in-person home visits resulted in higher scores for provider responsiveness and parent engagement. This study supports the effectiveness of telepractice in delivering early intervention services to families of children who are deaf or hard of hearing. Further research involving randomized trials with larger, more diverse populations is warranted.

Background:Optimal outcomes for children who are deaf/hard-of-hearing (DHH) depend on access to high quality, specialized early intervention services. Tele-intervention (TI), the delivery of early intervention services via telehealth technology, has the potential to meet this need in a cost-effective manner.Method:Twenty-seven families of infants and toddlers with varying degrees of hearing loss participated in a randomized study, receiving their services primarily through TI or via traditional in-person home visits. Pre- and post-test measures of child outcomes, family and provider satisfaction, and costs were collected.Results:The TI group scored statistically significantly higher on the expressive language measure than the in-person group (p =.03). A measure of home visit quality revealed that the TI group scored statistically significantly better on the Parent Engagement subscale of the Home Visit Rating Scales-Adapted & Extended (HOVRS-A+; Roggman et al., 2012). Cost savings associated with providing services via TI increased as the intensity of service delivery increased. Although most providers and families were positive about TI, there was great variability in their perceptions.Conclusions:Tele-intervention is a promising cost-effective method for delivering high quality early intervention services to families of children who are DHH.

Parents reported an array of challenges, even after their child had been wearing hearing aids for a prolonged time, revealing critical implications for how to provide audiological care. Audiologists have an important role in partnering with parents to identify and jointly problem-solving challenges related to their child's hearing aid use. Supporting parents includes not only addressing technical aspects of hearing testing and hearing aid function but also addressing parent thoughts, feelings, and emotions.

Significant progress has been made over the past two decades in reducing the age of hearing loss identification and hearing aid fitting for children who do not pass the NHS. However, many children continue to experience delays between hearing loss diagnosis and hearing aid fitting that exceed Joint Committee on Infant Hearing recommendations. The experiences parents reported provide valuable information about areas that need further investigation to improve the process for children with hearing loss.

The authors discuss cultural influences on clinical interactions when treating late talkers, 2-to 3-year-old children with primary language delays. They use the literature to examine the cultural relevance of core components of early language treatment and propose alternative professional actions in the cases of cultural mismatches. Alternative actions include triadic or multiparty treatments, the inclusion of siblings or others, more structured tasks or group settings for language training, and shaping of culturally congruent directive language techniques. Also discussed is the need for an emphasis on social language use and professional clarity regarding links between early child language ability and later achievements in order to motivate treatment.

The use of telehealth has been discussed nationally as an option to address provider shortages for children, birth through two, enrolled in Part C of the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) Early Intervention (EI) programs. Telehealth is an evidence-based service delivery model which can be used to remove barriers in providing EI services to children and their families. In 2016, Colorado’s Part C Early Intervention (EI) program began allowing the use of telehealth as an option for providers to conduct sessions with children and their caregivers. This article outlines the process taken to develop the necessary requirements and supports for telehealth to be incorporated into EI current practice.

This study examines the impact of repeated exposures on word learning of preschool children with and without hearing loss (HL) in quiet and noise conditions. Participants were 19 children with HL and 17 peers with normal hearing (NH). Children were introduced to 16 words: 8 in quiet and 8 in noise conditions. Production and identification scores were collected after single exposures to words and following three exposures through individual training sessions. A significant main effect for Exposure was found for identification with significant Hearing Status × Exposure interaction, with children in the NH outperforming the HL group when only one exposure to the target words was provided. Repeated exposures to target words provide benefits to both groups of preschool children, but offer additional benefits to children with HL, particularly younger children. This provides additional support for speech–language pathologists to preview and review vocabulary introduced in classroom settings.

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