The Ida Institute is pleased to announce the launch of our first tool specially designed for the parents of children with cochlear implants. My Turn to Talk will help parents prepare for appointments, so they can articulate their needs and concerns to their children’s hearing care professionals.
My Turn to Talk is exclusively web-based, and uses drag-and-drop technology to allow the user to place important communication partners in rings, similar to our Communication Rings tool. This is followed up by a series of prompts including “I’m happy about…” “I hope…” “I want to talk about…” and “I’m concerned about…” for the parents to fill out. The seven prompts will help parents organize their thoughts and ensure that the hearing care professional address their concerns during the appointment.
My Turn to Talk is also the first of our new tele-health tools to be released. These tools have been designed for hearing care professionals to send to their patients to complete at home prior to the appointment. By using the tools and filling out the questions ahead of time, patients are not only prepared to discuss certain topics when they get to the appointment, but there is also more time free during the session for the actual counseling. We will be releasing additional tools soon.
My Turn to Talk is a result of our seminar, “Successes, Gaps and Challenges in CI Rehabilitation: The CI Journey for Children and Their Families.” We thank our participants for their inspired work and the collaborative efforts that made My Turn to Talk possible.