LM212 - Guiding College Students Through Listening Needs and Self-Advocacy

Abstract:
Students pursuing post-secondary education face many barriers to accessing quality healthcare and may struggle to self-advocate to acquire equitable disability services. For young adults with hearing disorders, ongoing audiologic care is crucial for overall health and access to educational and social experiences. This presentation will explore self-advocacy training while providing quality care to college age patients with hearing loss, auditory processing concerns, tinnitus, hyperacusis, etc. Strategies for bridging the gap between pediatric and adult audiologic services will also be discussed. This session will provide attendees with resources for working with students and universities to reach this crucial, often lost population.

Summary:
Healthcare disparities are differences in clinical outcomes that occur because of age, gender, race, socioeconomic status, sexual orientation or disability. Research shows that college students experience significant stress levels that can attribute to need for medical attention but are often ignored due to barriers to care.

Barriers to care for college students can include a lack of insurance coverage as adults ages 19-34 have the highest uninsured rate of any group in the US according to the US Census Bureau, lack of transportation, stress, inexperience with navigating the health system, and concern for the financial impact among others.

Barriers to performance in college may be related to limited instruction in self advocacy. Students often receive services in the classroom from primary school through high school. When they transition to college, students will not receive accommodations unless they self-identify their needs with the disability resource office for their school. A longitudinal study on students with high-incidence mild disabilities indicated 87.1% utilized services in high school, whereas of the same cohort only 10.3% accessed reasonable accommodations at the college level (Sanford et al., 2011). This further led to only 40.7% of the students in the study meeting their post-secondary education goal of completing a 2- or 4-year degree. (Sanford et al., 2011). Despite IDEA mandating student involvement in transition planning and advocacy skills, many students with hearing disorders graduate high school and are underprepared to advocate for services in college (Punch & Duncan, 2022).

This presentation will discuss barriers to care and how to design programs and resources to allow for better access to care as our once pediatric patients transition to college life. This starts with student awareness of their disability and understanding their personal needs and continues with methods for patient self-advocacy training. (Holzberg et al., 2019). We will further discuss how pediatric and adult audiologists can work together during this critical period of transition of care to optimize their patient success.

College students are in many unique listening environments from large lecture halls to bars, from dorm rooms to athletic fields. We will address how to assist patients with hearing loss, auditory processing, tinnitus, misophonia and hyperacusis as they navigate the variety of listening needs necessary to be successful educationally and socially.

We will look at case studies and lead a discussion as to how audiology as a profession can better serve this unique, often forgotten patient population. College students are experiencing a huge transition and Audiologists need to thoughtfully prepare for how we can aid in this and provide the tools for our patients to adequately advocate for their listening needs.

References:

Holzberg, D. G. et. al (2019). Self-Advocacy Instruction to Teach High School Seniors With Mild Disabilities to Access Accommodations in College.

Renée Punch & Jill Duncan (2022) A Model of Targeted Transition Planning for Adolescents who are Deaf or Hard of Hearing.

Sanford, C., et al (2011). The post-high school outcomes of young adults with disabilities up to 6 years after high school.