After thinking about the information provided by Professor Wilson in class Carla decided to go to Wisconsin during spring break and take Grandpa Carl, who was now 84, to an audiologist to look into his condition. She knew she might have some trouble with Grandma Marie because she was not at all convinced that Grandpa had anything wrong with him. In her mind, Grandpa just did not pay attention to her when she was talking to him. Carla remembered her mother suggesting to Grandma at Christmas that she take Grandpa to a doctor to check his hearing. “He doesn’t have any hearing problems. He just won’t listen to me. Selective hearing loss is what I call it. Besides, doctors never really do anything for you other than tell you what you already know and take your money; I have no use for them,” Grandma had said.
Carla called her mother and told her what she had discovered in class and that she would like to take Grandpa Carl to an audiologist to see if there was anything they could do for him. Kathy knew her mother would have difficulty with her father going to the doctor, but after 48 years she had learned how to handle her mother. “You set up an appointment for Grandpa and I’ll deal with your grandmother, but whatever you do, don’t tell either of them what we are up to,” she told Carla.
Two days later Carla and her mother were making the trip north to the farm and house they both loved. They arrived late on Saturday evening and within an hour Kathy had the fireplace blazing. While Grandpa stared at the fire, mother, daughter, and granddaughter had a wonderful conversation catching up on all that had happened since they were together at Christmas.
“Mom, could you take me over to Menominee to see the place where you grew up and to visit Grandma and Grandpa’s graves?” Kathy asked her mother at breakfast on Wednesday morning. “Carla has some studying to do and I know Dad likes to take a late morning nap so I thought maybe we could spend the day together retracing my heritage.”
“I would love to, Kathy, you were always my sentimental child,” her mother responded. “Have a productive study time,” Kathy said, winking at Carla as she and Grandma headed out the door.
Thirty minutes later Carla found Grandpa sitting on the porch reading the morning paper. “Let’s go for a ride, Grandpa,” she said, “I have someone I would like you to meet. I think you’ll like her.”
Carla took her grandfather to Dr. Susan Dlugopolski, an audiologist in Marinette who had recently graduated from the University of Wisconsin—Madison and come back to the town where she had grown up. Grandpa Carl had worked with Susan’s grandfather at the Chrysler dealership in Marinette for 37 years and, while Grandpa and Susan did not know each other well, her outgoing and friendly demeanor immediately put him at ease.
For the next 30 minutes Susan carefully explained to Grandpa Carl and Carla that there were a number of things that could contribute to hearing loss as an individual ages, a condition known as presbycusis. Carla listened intently to her explanations, asked many questions, and learned as much in half an hour as she had all semester long in class. Like many people she always learned more when she could put facts into some context, and this experience with her grandfather provided a wonderful learning opportunity.
Following some testing, Susan informed both Grandpa Carl and Carla that she found significant hearing loss, but she did not find significant metabolic dysfunction in the cochlea, nor did she find significant dysfunction of the auditory nerve. To illustrate some of the main points of their discussion, Susan showed Carla and Grandpa Carl the following chart.
Source Information for Graph: Redrawn with minor updates by David R. Hill, Prof. Emeritus, University of Calgary. Versions of this diagram appear in several places across the decades. You will find it in the 9th edition of Best & Taylor’s Physiological Basis of Medical Practice (The Williams & Wilkins Co., Baltimore, 1973—J.R. Brobeck editor, page 8–36). They attribute it to J.C.R. Licklider’s chapter in S.S. Steven’s book Handbook of Experimental Psychology (John Wiley: New York 1951, page 997). Licklider attributes it to C.T. Morgan’s Physiological Psychology (McGraw-Hill: New York 1943) "after Bunch, 1929" (Bunch, CC, “Age variations in Auditory Acuity,” Arch. Otolaryng. 1929, Vol 9, pages 620–623).
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