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Subscribe to RSSStephanie Montalvo has been legally deaf since birth, but the 15-year-old is now able to hear -- thanks to an organization that helps kids get hearing devices their families would not ordinarily be able to afford. NBC's Chelsea Clinton reports.
By Craig Stanley, NBC News
After enduring countless ear infections and several unsuccessful surgeries attempting to correct hearing deficiencies caused by a cleft palate—Stephanie Montalvo, 15, had all but given up on the ability to hear clearly and focused primarily on making the best of her circumstances.
“To be honest, I never thought I was going to be able to hear in that ear, ever in my life,” she said.
That was until she met Bill Austin, founder and CEO of Starkey Hearing Technologies, a man on a lifelong mission to change the world in a very specific way: by sharing the gift of sound. The two were united, along with 74 additional hearing loss patients, at a recent event at Yankee Stadium.
Bill Austin, Founder and CEO of Starkey Hearing Technologies describes the joy he gets from helping people hear.
Bill, his wife Tani Austin, and a fleet of ‘Hearing Angels’ were on deck at the ballpark to fit the patients with new, state-of-the art hearing aids. The devices—which can cost up to $10,000 dollars each, are powerful, discreet and most importantly, free of charge.
Since 2000, the Starkey Hearing Foundation’s “hearing missions” have touched down in more than 100 countries, and more than 800,000 hearing aids have been distributed globally. Their goal? To distribute at least one million hearing aids by the year 2020.
Stephanie Montalvo told NBCs Chelsea Clinton how her new hearing aids will help her when she plays sports, and her mother Angela Perez says Stephanie "has a whole new world."
Inside the stadium, Bill Austin carefully fit Stephanie with new hearing aids as her parents watched anxiously. A brief hearing test confirmed that, for the first time in eight years, she could hear clearly out of both ears.
“I feel like I’m a newborn baby, being able to hear again,” Stephanie told NBC News Correspondent Chelsea Clinton, shortly after being fitted. “That’s what I feel when I have this hearing aid on.”
Stephanie’s mother Angela Perez, who’s spent years agonizing over her daughter’s degenerative hearing issues, was equally moved.
“I'm so excited. Because I knew this was going to be a great opportunity to help her here,” she said. “But actually hearing […] that she can hear from an ear that she hasn't heard [from] in so long, it was just amazing.”
After the emotional fittings, patients had the opportunity to meet Yankee Manager Joe Girardi and third baseman Alex Rodriguez.
Yankee manager Joe Girardi tells NBC's Chelsea Clinton says he can't imagine not being able to hear.
“For them to come into a place of champions — the number one team — and have the players recognize them, it makes them feel like they’re special, they have value," said Austin. "And when they have value, dignity and self-worth, they start aspiring to the future.”
For Stephanie, she’s begun doing just that— and one day, she plans to teach hearing-impaired children how to play music – just as she’s taught herself. In addition, with Bill’s help, she took away more than just the ability to hear — she’s also got a new way of looking at things.
She recalls her doctors trying their best to help her hear, even if they thought there was no hope for her.
“You’ve got to try,” she said. “You can't give up on anything. Only try to find solutions … in life.”
Visit the Starkey Hearing Foundation website to learn more
Correction: an earlier version of this article stated that the Starkey Hearing Foundation plans to issue at least 10 million hearing aids by the year 2020. The correct number is one million.
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What?
You are what I call a functioning brain stem. You look intelligent, but the higher functions don't work.
Where do you see Romney???
Hearing aids are a big rip off..as tiny as they are they cost a bundle ( not even counting the exam)..they act like they are made of gold and diamonds.
Plus not all health insurance policy's cover hearing aids (eye glasses yes- they are cheaper)..hearing loss is hard to correct with money.. until there are regulations on hearing aids... most people will have to do without them.
The tiny ones cost more than the larger ones. You pay for the miniaturization.
If you're too cheap to buy small hearing aids, get the larger ones. You can get them at Costco.
Not that simple....the cost depends on how bad your hearing is..and for some there is no correction to hear again..even with cochlea operation at $50,000.
mike277,
You might feel differently if you had spent your entire life not being able to hear, and then, suddenly, a whole new world opens up to you. I have seen that happen first hand, and it is a wonderful thing.
I had only 50% hearing at the age of one...I'm 60 years old now with a 95% hearing loss..I invested thousands of dollars for hearing aids and doctor visits over my life time. Like I said hearing aids can't help all and if they could help some they cost a bundle (depending on amount of hearing loss).
And yes..all my life I was told the jokes..'can you hear me now' , 'huh', 'what' etc.
EVER hear of ASL. I use it all the time. It works 100% and cost nothing. American Sign Language, and you don't have to drill a hole in your child's head for a cochlear implant. I know first hand about the implant. I am small d deaf and have a friend who got a cochlear and pulled it off after less than a year. Parents need to back off and wait until the child is an adult and let them make their own choice. Hearing people try to push their lifestyle on their deaf children for their own benefit. The parents are too lazy to learn ASL. She will never be accepted in to the Deaf community. Most people I know who are deaf have good jobs and don't need a hearing aid or cochlear. Parents need to stop being ignorant about this issue. Your child is not broken and does not need fixing.
@Justincase.........I wear the cochlear implant daily and it makes all the difference in the world. Let me educate you on a few things. First, they don't drill any holes in your head when they perform the surgery. They make an incision behind the ear, thru which they insert the electrode into your cochlea, they then fit the magnet between your skull and your skin. Second, ASL is a wonderful thing, but it won't do a dang thing to help you communicate with the 99% of the population who have zero need to know it. Third, parents SHOULD fit their deaf children with a CI at the EARLIEST opportunity. If a child does not learn how to speak by age 7, then the part of the brain that processes sound remains stunted. This means that even if the deaf child should choose at age 18 to get the CI for themselves, they may never benefit from it because the part of their brain they need to hear was never given the opportunity to develop. Being a parent means providing your child with every opportunity you can. Denying them the implant is denying them the chance to choose later in life whether to join the world of the hearing or stay deaf. And last but not least, the "deaf community" thing, is a crutch. I hear this term all the time and it is nothing but an excuse for deaf people to hide from having to really interact with the rest of the world. It is one thing when there are no treatments which can fix your deafness, it's something else though when workable solutions exist, yet you refuse to take advantage of them. I guarantee you will never see a blind person or a paralyzed person refuse a proven treatment which will benefit them tremendously. Only in the "deaf community" do you see this. And it needs to stop.
my girlfriend is totally deaf she got that way from one of our great healthcare providing doctors giving her the wrong medication for meningitis (notice the sarcasm). i enjoy every moment with her and i love the fact that she can hear even just a little.
This video is clearly a commercial for Starkey hearing aids. The child they fit this hearing aid on is clearly not deaf but is hard of hearing and was functioning very well with hearing aids before Starkey put their hearing aid on her. Deaf children do not have speech and language ablities of this 15 year old girl.
No, hearing aids are not a ripoff! There are definitely affordable AND discreet hearing aids out there. Have you ever heard of Audicus.com?
Hearing aids are not a ripoff at all. There are definitely options out there for affordable AND discreet hearing aids. Have you ever heard of Audicus.com? Their hearing devices are inexpensive and practically invisible.
I wish I had someone to pay for me to get hearing aids. I guess I am just too old.
I hear ya!
Hey AL..I rather be deaf then have that disease you got!
Hey Al- Have your anal warts healed yet?
A DEAF person does not need to be "FIXED" as the article states. DEAF'deaf/hon do not need to be fixed! They are people not chairs that need to be fixed. I am in the DEAF community. They/we do just find thank you and quit trying to FIX us. We are very happy the way we are. Leave us alone....This so called Angel has been around for a long time and get free govt monies to do this. He is a ripoff.
You don't communicate for every deaf person in the world. Trying to stop people from bettering themselves dishonors the very community you claim to be a part of.
Justincase...yes of course deaf persons are people, just as those who have no sight are people. I feel everyone would do well to learn sign language and some schools teach it now routinely. I would like there to just be "community" among people rather than separateness. There is not much we can do about blindness, but we can all learn what would be helpful.
No. it's a huge ripoff. I've worn hearing aids for 20 years and just had to order a new pair. The new pair is lower middle of the road, $4000.00 - or let's just say ten times the price of a desktop computer plus monitor plus speakers on Black Friday. Do you really think hearing aids have more circuitry than a computer? It actually has far less than the control pad on your refrigerator.
To add insult to injury, these "hearing angels" are simply working publicity. Ain't in nice to have a goal of 10 million by 2020 when you've only donated 800K in 12 years. Hmm... that's shy of 67K per year, divided into 10 Mil and the maths say 1492 years - they'll reach their goal in the year 3492.
And I didn't buy Starkey. This time Resound won. Yea, Vikings! As much as I love Made in USA products (although some pretend to be) I will always purchase European.
Then there's the new Lyric "completely invisible". Yeah, right - they forget to mention the pull-out cord. And it's being advertised on cable TV 24/7. Hello, who pays for all that advertising? Reminds me of a Sleep Numbers mattress - $5000 for $150 worth of foam and lots of commercials.
As the mother of a deaf child who wears cochlear implants, I strongly DISAGREE with Justincase. I understand that the deaf community is proud and those who are implanted are looked down upon. But you should practice what you preach. You say to leave you alone, well leave those who are implanted alone. Quit giving them dirty looks and signing about them right in front of their face. I have witnessed this firsthand with my daughter.
I didn't try to "fix" my daughter by getting her cochlear implants. I gave her the chance to hear music, to hear her mommy's voice, to hear a dog bark, to hear birds chirp. Things you will never understand because you are too proud.
I am around several deaf and hard-of-hearing children on a daily basis and I can say that not one of them resents having an implant or hearing aid.
Amen!
If we never "fixed" anything, then those with cleft palates, strabismus, pigeon toes, nearsightedness and pectus excavatum should just stay home, right? We live in a technologically advanced society, with even greater achievements just down the road. While Starkey may not meet his goal of 10 million hearing aids by the year 2020, there ARE close to a million people worldwide who can hear, thanks to the generosity of one man. MZ, you did indeed "fix" your daughter because her ears were broken, and now she can hear - bravo! And, Justincase97403, you should be ashamed for attempting to beat those down who are only trying to improve THEIR quality of life.
And yet NBC has no cc (closed captioning) option for their vids. Too bad those who can't hear couldn't enjoy the story too....Shame on you!
Yeah, that's another issue that should be addressed. There is a glaring loophole in the law. Video streamed over the internet is not required to be close captioned.
First of all let me state that as a teacher of the deaf/hard of hearing I find this topic to be one of controversy. A person can have a hearing loss that ranges from a mild conductive loss to one that is a moderate to severe sensorineural loss. It all depends on the environment that they were raised in. Most of my students are considered hearing impaired because they have hearing parents and have been raised in an oral hearing environment and use amplification (hearing aids, FM systems) to aid them with the residual hearing that they have and they rely on this. Even if they have a severe sensorineural loss. A Deaf person is one that has been raised in a culture of Deaf people and they rely on ASL (American Sign Language) as their main mode of communication. ASL has it's own syntax, grammar and word order. It is their first language and English is their second language...just as a Spanish speaker or Laotian speaker has English as a second language. And Deaf do not normally use amplification unless for emergency purposes or to communicate with the hearing world. So, it depends on the culture one is brought up with not necessarily what type of hearing loss. Now as a teacher who has encountered kids who have been in need of hearing aids I think this is wonderful of Starkey. I have had to get funding for my students through organizations such as Children's Miracle Network as well as local organizations like Rotary clubs and church organizations. As stated a decent pair of hearing aids costs about $6,000 and insurance does not cover them!!!! So what this gentleman is doing is wonderful. This young lady in this article is a hearing impaired individual who now will utilize her residual hearing and use her threshold of hearing that she never had the opportunity to use before. So those of you who do not know...should not criticize. And Mr. Justin (Big D Deaf Sir) I understand your philosophy as I have Deaf friends and perhaps for you these two worlds will not collide but you need to respect the heard of hearing folks too as they need to respect your culture!!!!!
It's not a culture, it's an excuse. My brother went thru one of these deaf schools growing up. About the only thing I can tell that they teach these kids is ASL. In every other area they are woefully ignorant and happy to remain that way.
Parents and teachers shouldn't be satisfied with those results nor should these kids.
It is difficult to live with a person who has poor hearing and refuses to do anything about it. I believe it is false pride and selfishness. As many others have commented, if one cannot see well, they get glasses if one cannot walk any provision is readily accepted but when it comes to hearing, there is a compromise. Probably because it is not outwardly visible unless you wear a hearing aide = vanity and false pride.
With all the compassion in the world, God provided our society with the gifts needed to develop technology with good purpose. These devises make it possible to answer a loved one's call for help, enjoy the sound of a child's whisper, increase their own safety and the safety of others. I wish the person I describe could hear what I have go say instead of pretending to hear. I will probably have damaged hearing from the radio and TV being on it's highest decibel. Riding in a car with a person that cannot hear is another experience and should be outlawed.
If I ever have to call for help I would be out of luck!
@about time
Not true, Netflix has lost a lawsuit stating that their online streaming videos MUST have subtitles.
Now they have! How astute of you to gather that from the article above.
What happened to my comment?
Ironic reading! I have and is on both side of the fence. First the comment about ASL not costing anything is incorrect. First an ASL teacher that teaches ASL must meet serveral criteria to teach-most have to have a degree now to teach, pass a variety of ASL tests to be certified to teach, sign say in court, legal situations. So this cost monies. To say that many in deaf world have good paying jobs?? What minimum wage? I have up one year Masters study and was never given a chance at well paying jobs as most still have the thought "deaf and dumb"! There was always someone with an inferiority complex afraid to promote me however I was good enough to train many that did get promoted??? I do wish that ALL schools would stop the teaching of spanish, etc and instead teach ASL as it is universal, no matter of the original language one could use ASL wherever in the world it is taught! Also, as a Cochlear implant recepient I would like to correct an error above-there is a hole drilled through either the 7th or 8th nerve into the cochlea by which to insert the "coil". I know this as fact as my first implant was botched and the Dr messed up permanently my vestibular balance system. Fortunately, Dr Peter Roland at UT Southwestern-Dallas was able to correct the botched surgery a year later. The rest of the surgery procedure was correct. Yes, indeed there is a hugh battle between deaf and hearing community about cochlear implants/hearing aids, etc. Yes, if you have never had it how can you miss it-is true. Now that I was deaf for a while(I suddenly lost my hearing)-I missed the hearing as allowed me freedom to communicate, also to be able to hear my grandkids was a desire I have. I realise by now I may have stoke a fire some. With todays technology the deaf world does need to be open to the possibilites it offers. Maybe not the communication part but the safetyness of being alerted to danger. Ms America that was deaf got cochlear implants after having children and realized one day that her daughters were hurt and crying in the backyard-she only realised when her husband ran past her to check on the child. She got CIs in order to hear her children and safety. Unfortunately , the deaf world need to learn NOT to exclude someone because they wear hearing aids or cochlear implants! Embrace all just like YOU expect the hearing world to embrace YOU! I finally basically left trying to learn ASL as I was not accepted by the deaf community yet was ALSO not accepted by the hearing. So I was and am screwed either way I turn. Also someone mentioned the Close captioning---I am noticing many shows really messing up captions by just showing a Too fast to read or not at all. OR the person doing is just screwing around-anyone know how to make complaints?? I even worked at the US Postal Service and they really went out of there way to run deaf/hearing impaired off! The 'Scheme trainer" verbally told others she would make sure we fail the tests to cause us to be terminated--I managed 5 years of the HELL. I wished I had a lawyer as was told had a MAJOR lawsuit!
Wow, what negative posts. Thank you Mr. Austin for thinking of these kids and for giving them something they would not otherwise be able to afford. It seems like your kindness comes from within. Please keep doing this for those who wish to hear for the first time or again.
This is Stephanie's mom the girl in the video, first of all I want to thank everyone who wrote a positive comment, only God and the people that surround me know of all that Steph has lived through she was born with a cleft palate and has had issues with her hearing most of her life. Steph was never completely deaf, she had some hearing that allowed her to be in a general Education class. She was evaluated and placed in general Ed. because she was still able to hear. I have never tried to "fix" my daughter she is such a wonderful role model and my strength no matter what life has thrown at us she always has a positive outlook. All I have tried to do is improve her life like any parent knows. I am a teacher I understand all the struggles she has had in school. She is thrilled with her new hearing aids. Say what you want to say but my child is smiling and happy and Starkey helped me do that. As a mom seeing my child happy and enjoying hearing the music she loves to compose is the greatest thing for me. It breaks my heart that anyone can find something negative about this story.
It is great to read a story about human kindness and someone actually making a difference in this world, without expecting something in return. My sons girlfriend is mostly deaf (75% hearing loss in both ears) and cannot afford hearing aids, so I know what this means to the kids you are helping. Thank you Bill Austin.