The beginning of a new year is a great time to think about taking better care of yourself, and one step you can take to improve your quality of life is to check your hearing.

As we age, most of us tend to deny the subtle and not so subtle changes that occur- needing reading glasses, noticing the ever more frequent gray hairs, and having a harder time losing that extra weight we put on between Thanksgiving and the New Year. One of the most insidious changes that many of us encounter is the increasing difficulty of hearing. Whether it becomes apparent when we are in loud social situations, or when we have a harder time hearing higher pitched voices, or deciphering soft spoken voices on the telephone, or having our spouses or children complain that we keep the TV volume entirely too loud, many of us will begin to suspect that our hearing is not as good as it used to be.

Taking action to discover whether we have a hearing loss can be a daunting experience, but the consequences of not doing anything will be worse. A simple 5 minute hearing check can alert you to changes that you may have suspected, but been hesitant to acknowledge.

The Legal Ear challenges you to add one more resolution to your list- take the quick, painless and free five-minute hearing check. If you are experiencing hearing loss, here is an easy opportunity to move ahead and take the first step toward improving your functioning. If your hearing is fine, then you can rest assured that you have avoided the penalties some discover after waiting too long.

Denial may make the world go round, as Benedict Carey suggests in his article from the New York Times Health Section on Tuesday, November 20^th, but the costs of denial can be high, even devastating in some populations. 

For those who have late onset hearing loss, the costs- physical, emotional and economic - can be colossal. If that person is a member of a profession like Law for example, the stakes are much higher.  Sensory faculties which are fully intact are essential to a lawyer’s ability to hear precisely every word, including sighs, vocal robustness, inflections and other vocal dynamics which might undercut the truth of the literal words spoken by a witness. 

One aspect of hearing loss that makes it particularly dangerous for lawyers is its insidious nature.  After first noticing a problem, affected persons will often wait up to fifteen years before having their hearing checked.  During that period, hearing loss typically progresses very slowly and as it deteriorates, the listener habituates to the loss with every downward step until the cumulative process compromises the lawyer’s ability to comprehend speech.  It means for some lawyers that they don’t cognitively process parts of information and instructions they are given by a judge, opposing counsel, witness, or anyone else involved in the trial process including their own client. It’s one thing for the lawyer to realize that something’s missing and can ask for clarification.  It’s quite another when the lawyer doesn’t know that a statement has been made and hence doesn’t know to ask any clarifying questions.  

Adding to the glacial progression of hearing deterioration, is the reluctance of well-meaning colleagues, support personnel, friends and family members, to confront the lawyer with statements regarding their observations of the lawyer’s behavior which tend to belie the belief that no problem exists that materially affects his or her hearing sensitivity.  Complicating matters further, many lawyers, (especially litigators),  during their years of competitive growth, develop “hyper-healthy” egos and mindsets of invincibility which don’t allow for any view of themselves as other than warriors of Olympian strength and endurance.  To acknowledge a hearing loss either by oral admission or by wearing a hearing aid which might stigmatize the listener as old, slow or feeble-minded is tantamount to professional suicide, or so some lawyers believe. It exposes an Achilles heal that an opponent can exploit and a prospective client can use as a basis for choosing another lawyer. 

Unfortunately, this confluence of so many defenses makes it relatively easy for some lawyers to continue denying the existence of a medical problem they’d just soon forget anyway.  So, they continue to assert that their hearing “just isn’t all that bad . . . [or] . . . not serious enough to buy hearing aids . . . [or] . . . just fine as long as people quit mumbling and speak up.”  It is particularly noteworthy that the longer one waits to seek help, the greater the likelihood that the hearing loss will continue to worsen and may deteriorate to the point where part of the hearing may be irretrievably lost and hearing aids are no longer a viable option.   

From the standpoint of emotions, the impact of hearing loss is felt in every quarter of a person’s life.  Perhaps the greatest threat to emotional well-being is the very powerful tendency to isolate, i.e., to avoid doing things or being in places where the lawyer is exposed to court clerks, paralegals, other lawyers, judges or others who might observe him or her struggling to bluff through a transaction. In fact, such people are likely to appear slow, tentative, socially inept, confused, disoriented and arrogant.  Social isolation also can result in increased drinking and other forms of self-medication.  Also at risk are longstanding relationships with friends, family and business associates who grow weary of attempting to communicate with someone challenged with so obvious a problem, yet so unwilling to take any corrective action. 

Obviously, this self-imposed seclusion can negatively impact one’s sense of worth and hasten the onset of depression and anxiety.  Overall, the experience of this writer is common to many, i.e., the loss of confidence in one’s ability to correctly process information and act or not act, exercise appropriate judgment and render sound advice based on the interpretation.        

Clearly, for the lawyer who continues to deny the presence of a hearing loss and continues to practice, especially as the signs of impairment continue to mount, the stakes grow continually higher.  By so doing, the lawyer places himself and the client at risk for unwanted outcomes and potential civil suits for malpractice against the lawyer and his firm.  It also subjects the lawyer’s career to unnecessary stress during its peak period of development, with the potential for significant professional implications under the Rules of Professional Conduct against the lawyer, his firm or those with whom he practices.  

Homer Mullins                             © The Legal Ear 2007-2008 

We begin this blog with a discussion of some basics and key concepts which will make it easier to understand some of the myths about hearing loss (“HL”) that make it so difficult for many lawyers to quit denying that they have issues that need tending and go in for a hearing test. Depending on the response of our readers, we may pursue exposing more of the myths for a while, discuss the latest headlines relevant to our topic or take up some other issues of interest, returning later to the myths. Some of the more current issues we may address include HL in the baby boomer population; noise-induced HL brought on by rock concerts, volume intense entertainment devices such as the i-Pod, and other sounds germane to a thriving and robust modern economy. Also of considerable interest are the latest advances in hearing aid technology and assistive listening devices which can help hearing challenged lawyers to stay competitive in the traditional areas of law practice where complete control over ones ability to perceive speech and understand subtext is critical to the proper handling of a client’s affairs.  

With no slight intended, our blog is focused primarily on the issues confronting hard-of-hearing (“HOH”) lawyers who practice in the public and private sectors; serve as judges, or their clerks, on the state and federal benches; or hold positions in a legally related field such as legal education in the traditional law school setting. Too, it covers law school students and those who are considering a career in law.   

The issues of those who were born Deaf, and others who were deafened later in childhood and use signing as their primary means of communication, are unique to that population and beyond the scope of matters we anticipate bringing to the table.  However, the input of Deaf lawyers can be quite valuable and we welcome their comments on issues under discussion. 

Our target is the population of lawyers who acquire HL during adulthood and communicate orally. Our purpose is eventually to educate them about the insidious dangers associated with undiagnosed and untreated HL that can upend careers in the prime of their professional lives. In doing so, we also hope to raise the level of awareness about hearing loss generally in the legal profession. 

Perhaps most important, we will strive to quicken a sense of hope even to the most seriously affected, that there are options open to those who are willing to work through their denial and flexible enough to accept help from professionals who can assist them in re-gaining their functionality. It is especially important to note that the affected lawyer is not the only person at risk; in addition to families, co-workers and friends, the HL of challenged lawyers can also subject to unwanted outcomes, other lawyers working on same side of a case who may be following their lead; the firms, if any, who employ them; and most importantly, the clients they serve.                                

The human ear is far more complicated than one might think. It easily outperforms in range and sensitivity the most sophisticated sound systems ever devised. After reading the following brief description of how the ear interprets sound, one sees the complexity of the hearing process and should be able to understand why any deterioration or malfunction in the system can wreak havoc in a person’s ability to perceive and interpret speech.  In a cavity containing a series of chambers, all well protected by cartilage and bone, there is a delicate, precisely tuned auditory mechanism through which sound impulses from the outside environment pass and are prepared for transmission to the brain. To illustrate briefly the complexity of the process, acoustic energy of the environment (think of it as a “message”) is perceived and funneled down the outside ear canal to the ear drum where it sets in motion a thin tympanic membrane covering the drum, converting the message from sound pressure to mechanical energy. 

From that point, at the beginning of the middle ear, a process is initiated whereby the mechanical energy is converted to hydraulic energy after passing through the tiny ossicular bones in the middle ear to the cochlea.  By the time it leaves the cochlea, another energy conversion has taken place and the message has become encoded with electrical energy. The acoustic nerve is the last point through which the message passes before entering the neural pathways which will take it to the brain for decoding into language that the brain can understand, and react, or not, as appropriate to the situation.    

Many, if not most, people believe that HL is a manifestation of reduced loudness, as if someone turned down the volume on a radio.  If only it were that simple we could have solved this problem years ago without the huge commitment of money for investment in technology.  But, as we will discuss more in postings to come, HL is usually much more than a loudness issue. Some lawyers, most of them in denial, will attempt to shift the blame away from themselves by saying their HL is really someone else’s fault, “I hear just fine but others mumble, or talk too softly or too fast, and I can’t understand them.” True enough, this description is consistent with one type of HL known as “conductive hearing loss” (“CHL”) that can result in a reduction of loudness due to interference with the “conduction” of sound waves through the mechanical portion of the auditory system in the outer and middle ears. It mostly affects persons under age 20.  

Examples would include the common cold, a wax build-up in the outer canal, or an ear infection which can interfere with the tympanic membrane’s freedom of movement when set in motion by sound waves coming into the ear from the outside, thereby resulting in a temporary HL.  As adults, affected lawyers often experience another type of HL which can develop either on its own, or in conjunction with CHL. This second type, known as sensori-neural hearing loss (“SNHL”), results from a dysfunction of the inner ear, and is often referred to as “nerve loss.” SNHL can occur by itself, or co-exist with CHL in which case one could be said to have yet a third type of HL, i.e., a “mixed hearing loss”. SNHL is unlike CHL which generally is treatable medically or by surgical intervention; if for some reason a patient’s CHL is treatment- resistive, hearing aids can do a lot to compensate for the loss of volume. On the other hand, SNHL, resulting as it does from damage to the delicate hair cells inside the cochlea, is not so easily and economically treated.  Once it sets in, the condition is usually progressive and permanent.  In addition to some loss of loudness, the overriding result is a distortion of the signal such that nothing sounds clear any more. This manifestation is the main reason why persons with SNHL generally have more difficulty understanding speech.   

Now having covered some of the basics, our next post will take up some of the “bumps” that can upset your hearing sensitivity and ability to perceive and understand speech.  Beyond that general discussion, we are not licensed to assist you, but will be happy to discuss generally some treatment options and communication strategies available, and refer you to qualified hearing/speech specialists who will provide you with assistance that can help you stay competitive. 

Welcome to the official website of The Legal Ear.

While we realize there is a population of lawyers who have been severely hearing challenged since birth or childhood, our primary focus is on helping to increase awareness and educate lawyers and law students about the personal and professional challenges and risks associated with undetected and untreated hearing loss. 

The impact of untreated hearing loss for lawyers can be significant. In a nation with just over a million licensed attorneys, the Better Hearing Institute estimates that approximately 13.4%, or 148,000 lawyers, have some form of hearing loss. Eighty percent of that subset have not sought treatment, and the majority have had signs of the problem for as long as 15 years without taking remedial action. What is the practice of law like for lawyers in this subset who continue in their practice despite these challenges? What options are available for those who choose to do something else in another career field? How does their hearing loss impact their clients, colleagues, and others who work around them? Are there implications for their firms that should be addressed?

Disclosure:  Neither Homer Mullins, J.D., Norma Svedosh, Ph.D., Odyssey Coaching, Odyssey Hearing Solutions, The Legal Ear nor anyone else connected with the foregoing persons and entities, have any relationship with any manufacturer, researcher, or any college or university including

Gallaudet University, which might suggest or condone bias either for or against any position taken by them on this Blog.  Further, the parties state that they have received no money or any other thing of value which is germane to any opinion or position expressed by them on this Blog.