From the Editor: Monthly Review - Happy New Year?

There has been a lot of negative news out there on the economy lately;this has even most recently included a 6.56% drop in hearing aid sales for the 4th quarter of 2008 compared to the same period in 2007 according to HIA. I am sure that this economic downturn has impacted many of you either directly or indirectly.

Opportunities

As all of you know, I am a half-full type of person. Here at AudiologyOnline, we are looking for ways to fine tune our own internal processes and procedures to make sure that we are focusing on the right things. We are trying to see the current economic climate as an opportunity to become smarter at what we do. We want to hopefully come out of this time period stronger than we were before. I know that many of you are trying to do the same thing and many of you are being asked to do more with less.

Our Continuing Education Stimulus Package for 2009

In our own small way, we at AudiologyOnline want to offer you our members a Continuing Education Stimulus Package for 2009. We know that budgets are tight and want to offer several things that will help you become better informed and be more effective at your work. This 4 part package includes:

1) Our CEU Total Access Program - All of the premium AudiologyOnline sponsored recorded and text courses, hundreds of courses, now only $99 annually.

2) Our Manufacturer Sponsored Courses - Stay on top of the latest technology developments with live and recorded courses from the leading names in the industry. These courses are offered free of charge.

3) Our Expert Seminar Series - New for 2009, we will still be bringing you the biggest and brightest names in Audiology live every week to talk live via our eLearning platform on a wide array of topics. These live events are provided free of charge. Can't make the live events? We record all of them and they are available 24/7 via our CEU Total Access Program.

4) Additional articles, interviews, and more from our Contributing Experts. Here is a sampling from our most recent publications

Pamela Souza, Ph.D., Severe Hearing Loss - Recommendations for Fitting Amplification

Cindy Pichler, Au.D., Improving Communication and Counseling for Pediatric Audiology Evaluations

Camille C. Dunn, Ph.D. and Kenneth Marcinak, B.A., Options for Preserving Residual Hearing with a Cochlear Implant

Kris Erickson, Au.D., (C)APD Testing and Interpreting 101: Recommendations for Audiologists

We hope that you can find these resources helpful in 2009 and we do want to know if you have an additional suggestions for any topics or speakers/writers that you want to see come onto the Web site. We want to make this Continuing Education Stimulus Package the best that it can be. Also remember that all of our CEUs are completed online and this can save you money on travel expenses.

Thank You For Reading

Thanks for reading and I would also like to encourage you to peruse our monthly Around The Web which includes a deaf dog is taught sign-language, hearing aids & bras (what?!), noisy eyeballs & tinnitus, golf risky for hearing, dangerous toys, a signing Santa, Grace's Law passes and many more! Take a look at how the rest of the world views our profession, it is always interesting. Also, please be sure to view the content links on the right to see more about what is going on at AudiologyOnline.

Best regards,

Paul Dybala, Ph.D. - Audiologist
President & Editor-in-Chief, Audiology Online