American Diabetes Association
Alert Day

March 7, 2010

We’re doing our part to stop diabetes! This year, for the first time ever, BHI is participating in the American Diabetes Association Alert Day—a one-day, “wake-up” call asking the American public – “What will you do to Stop DiabetesSM? Know your risk.” Held on the fourth Tuesday of every March, the 22nd annual Diabetes Alert Day is scheduled for Tuesday, March 23, 2010.

BHI is urging hearing health professionals across the country to join us in the Stop Diabetes movement. By encouraging hearing health patients to take the Diabetes Risk Test, the hearing health community can help save lives. The Diabetes Risk Test, created by the American Diabetes Association, asks users to answer simple questions about weight, age, family history, and other potential risks for pre-diabetes or type 2 diabetes. The test shows users whether they are at low, moderate, or high risk for type 2 diabetes. If they are at high risk, they are encouraged to talk with their health care provider.

Hearing loss is about twice as common in adults with diabetes compared to those who do not have the disease, according to a study funded by the National Institutes of Health (NIH). Yet hearing screenings typically are not part of the regular regimen of care that people with diabetes are routinely recommended to receive. Nor do the vast majority of doctors in today’s health care system include hearing health as a routine part of annual exams, leaving people with diabetes all the more vulnerable to the negative impact that unaddressed hearing loss has on an individual’s life.

Diabetes is a serious disease that threatens the lives of far too many Americans. While diabetes already strikes nearly 24 million children and adults in the United States, an additional 57 million, or one in five Americans, have pre-diabetes and are at high risk for developing type 2 diabetes.

BHI believes strongly that it is important that the hearing healthcare community become increasingly involved in diabetes outreach efforts. Until the day that we can stop diabetes altogether, let’s do what we can to make a meaningful difference in the lives of people with this disease by educating them on how they can identify and address diabetes-related hearing loss and take action to better preserve both their health and quality of life.

There are several ways you can participate in American Diabetes Alert Day. Here are just some ideas:

• Organize a hearing screening in your community on March 23, Diabetes Alert Day, encouraging visitors to take the Diabetes Risk Test as well as to get their hearing tested.
• Host a health fair and team up with other healthcare professionals.
• Host a walk or run in your community.
• Disseminate Diabetes Alert Day and hearing health information, including English and Spanish versions of the Diabetes Risk Test and the Diabetes Alert Day Backgrounder.
• Issue a customized press release and share our BHI diabetes and hearing loss backgrounder facts – http://www.betterhearing.org/professionals/tools.cfm (Under the title ADA Stop Diabetes Campaign).
• Send information through listservs.
• Hang posters in prominent locations such as your office, library, local mall, or church.
• Include a Diabetes Alert Day banner on your web site.
• Include an article on Diabetes Alert Day in your newsletter, on your web site, or as a handout in your office.
• Include a BHI article on diabetes and hearing health in your newsletter, on your web site, or as a handout in your office—or send it to your local newspaper for publication.

To download materials on American Diabetes Association Alert Day, visit http://www.diabetes.org/community-events/programs/alert-day/

To download BHI press information on the American Diabetes Association Alert day, visit http://www.betterhearing.org/professionals/tools.cfm (Under ADA Stop Diabetes Campaign)

PC Magazine – March 4, 2010
————

–

YouTube Makes Captioning Available to All

by Mark Hachman

Google’s YouTube on Thursday announced that it has moved its automatic
speech-recognition and closed-captioning technology out of beta and have now
made it available to the YouTube community at large.

Most, if not all, YouTube videos now include a “CC” button that, if pressed,
will automatically generate the closed-captioning technology. The technology
processes the audio feed, using the speech-recognition technology used in
the core voice search feature that has also built into the Android voice
search feature, the GOOG-411 phone search, and other products.

Twenty hours of videos are uploaded to YouTube every minute; Google could
not provide a timetable on when all of the videos would be captioned, but it
will be “very soon,” executives said.

Google rolled out the closed-captioning technology in beta form back in
November, along with a technology to help synchronize the captions to the
actual video.

The technology still isn’t perfect, but Google is also using YouTube, with
its vast array of accents, languages, background noise, and other
distractions to improve its technology.

But the closed-captioning also means that millions of users who are hard of
hearing, deaf, or simply speak another language as their primary language
can now have a greater access to YouTube videos, the company said. “A core
part of YouTube’s DNA is access to content,” said Hunter Walk, the product
team lead for YouTube. “From day one, that’s what we were hoping to do with
video.”

At the present, YouTube can only “understand” spoken English to
auto-generate the caption track. However, Google’s translation services can
also take the English machine-transcription track and translate it to up to
fifty languages. Adding more languages that Google understands “is a
priority,” said Mike Cohen, a speech technologist at Google.

“This is huge,” said Ken Harrenstien, a software engineer at Google and one
of the project’s leaders. “You can go to any video online and now you can
see some captions. It’s not perfect; we know it’s not perfect. Sometimes
it’s funny. But I love it.”

Users can also edit and assist in the transcription. Any text editor or any
tool that’s used to edit caption files can edit the machine transcription,
Google executives said, and then re-upload it for others to use.

On older videos, a button may appear that allows users to request a machine
transcription of the audio. When pressed, an automated request is generated
to the process that generates the transcription. With enough requests, the
video will be pushed upward in the queue. Google executives said that a
typical request may take a few hours to a day or two to be transcribed. As
the process improves, already-transcribed videos may be re-transcribed,
Cohen said.

Google has also partnered with a number of content partners, including UC
Berkeley, Stanford, Duke University, MIT, PBS, National Geographics, and
Demand Media.

Editor’s Note: This story was updated at 11:33 AM PT with additional
details.

I personally have seen ear candles in action and they do not work! I have seen 3 cerumen(wax) impacted ears on the video otoscope and then candles were used on all 3 people. The end result, all 3 ears were still impacted, and to top it off they now had burnt candle ash on top of their impaction. This is a pretty good article, but nothing compares from seeing this up close and personal. Be afraid, very afraid!

Don’t Get Burned: Stay Away From Ear Candles

A lit “candle” that can drip hot wax into your ear, usually as you lie on your side.

Sound dangerous? The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) thinks so, and is warning consumers to steer clear of products being sold as ear candles.

These “candles”—hollow cones that are about 10 inches long and made from a fabric tube soaked in beeswax, paraffin, or a mixture of the two—are being marketed as treatments for a variety of conditions. These conditions include ear wax buildup, sinus infections, hearing loss, headaches, colds, flu, and sore throats.

Marketers of ear candles claim that warmth created by the lit device produces suction that draws wax and other impurities out of the ear canal.

“Some ear candles are offered as products that purify the blood, strengthen the brain, or even ‘cure’ cancer,” says Eric Mann, M.D., Ph.D., clinical deputy director of FDA’s Division of Ophthalmic, Neurological, and Ear, Nose, and Throat Devices.

He adds that some firms claim the candles are appropriate for use on children.

But FDA warns that ear candles can cause serious injuries, even when used in accordance to manufacturers’ directions. “Also,” says Mann, “FDA believes that there is no valid scientific evidence for any medical benefit from their use.”

back to top

Burns and Other Risks

Mann says that ear candling—the procedure is also called “ear coning” and “thermal auricular therapy”—exposes the recipient to risks such as

• starting a fire
• burns to the face, ear canal, eardrum, and middle ear
• injury to the ear from dripping wax
• ears plugged by candle wax
• bleeding
• puncture of the eardrum
• delay in seeking needed medical care for underlying conditions such as sinus and ear infections, hearing loss, cancer, and temporomandibular joint (TMJ) disorders. (TMJ disorders often cause headache and painful sensations in the area of the ear, jaw, and face).

Even many promoters of ear candles warn potential users to have the procedure done by an experienced “candler,” and to not use the candles on themselves.

Ear candling involves placing the candle in the outer ear, usually while the recipient lies on his or her side. It is also done with the recipient sitting upright.

Often, before being lit, the candle is placed through a hole located in the center of a plate. The plate is supposed to protect against hot wax or ash coming down the side of the device and onto the recipient.

back to top

Enforcement

FDA and the Canadian health regulatory agency Health Canada have acted against manufacturers of ear candles. These actions have included import alerts, seizures, injunctions, and warning letters. FDA import alerts identify products that are suspected of violating the law so that agency field personnel and U.S. Customs and Border Protection staff can stop these entries at the border prior to distribution in the United States.

In February 2010, FDA issued warning letters to three large manufacturers of ear candles. These firms were informed that FDA had determined that there was no agency approval or clearance, no manufacturing facility registration or device listing, and no adverse-event reporting systems in place in regard to their ear candles.

FDA will continue to take enforcement action when appropriate.

back to top

Concern for Children

Claims that ear candling is appropriate for kids have caused great concern at FDA. “Children of any age, including babies, are at increased risk for injuries and complications if they are exposed to ear candles,” says Mann.

He adds that small children and infants may move while the device is being used, increasing the likelihood of wax burns and ear candle wax plugging the ear canal. “Also, their smaller ear canal size may make children more susceptible than adults to injuries from ear candles,” he says.

Since FDA views ear candles as medical devices, manufacturers seeking approval to sell them must submit evidence to FDA that the products are safe and effective.

back to top

Reports of Injuries

FDA believes that injuries associated with ear candles are likely underreported, and encourages consumers and health care professionals to report such injuries to FDA’s MedWatch Adverse Event Reporting program⁴.

Over the past decade, FDA has received reports of burns, punctured eardrums, and blockage of the ear canal which required outpatient surgery from the use of ear candles.

In its testing, Health Canada found that ear candles produce no measurable effect in the ear and have no therapeutic value.

And in a survey published in 1996, the medical journal Laryngoscope reported 13 cases of burns of the ear, seven cases of ear canal blockage due to wax, and one case of a punctured eardrum.

That study also reported that ear candles produced no measurable vacuum pressure or suction on a model of the ear, and that burning ear candles dripped candle wax onto the eardrum of test subjects and of the ear model.

This article appears on FDA’s Consumer Updates page⁵, which features the latest on all FDA-regulated products.

Date Posted: February 18, 2010

back to top

For More Information

• Advice for Patients: Ear Candles⁶
• http://www.fda.gov/MedWatch/report.htm⁷