Bernstein/Brewer Aural Rehabilitation Lab (B/Bar Lab)

The B/BAR lab is directing a series of randomized controlled studies aimed at evaluating the effect of aural rehabilitation interventions on adult cochlear implant (CI) outcomes.

As part of these evidence-based studies, we are engaged in creating new CI assessment and outcome measures, auditory training software, and innovative rehabilitation training programs to improve communication and quality of life for adult and older adult cochlear implant users. The lab is part of the research team with the Rehabilitation Engineering Research Center (RERC) Deaf/Hard of Hearing Technology at Gallaudet.

Facilities

Research Lab for Hearing, Speech, and Language Sciences programs. The research lab has a double-walled sound treated audiometric test booth for evaluations. The Clinical Center has large acoustically treated observation/analysis rooms available for the provision of rehabilitative training.

People

Claire Marcus Bernstein (Gallaudet University) and Diane Brewer (Professor Emerita, George Washington University) are Co-PIs on the current project looking at optimizing outcomes speech recognition, cognition, quality of life, and neural responses for older adult cochlear implant users with auditory brain training.

Additional Investigators on this project include: David Thornton, Larry Medwetsky, and Kristen Thornton ( Gallaudet University), and Samira Anderson as Consultant (University of Maryland-College Park).

Multi-site aural rehabilitation intervention studies included the following investigators and clinical sites:

• Matthew Bakke (Gallaudet University)
• Paula Schauer (University of Maryland at College Park)
• Anne Olson and Karah Gottschalk (University of Kentucky Health Sciences Center)
• Cassandra Bosworth, Jaclyn Spitzer, and Elizabeth Machmer (Columbia University Medical Center)
• Nancy Muscato and Kailey Introcaso (University of South Florida)
• Gina Stillitano, Rachel Vovos, and Sarah Sydlowski (The Cleveland Clinic)