Audiology
Hearing Health Center (HHC) was founded in 1984 by Dr. Ronna Fisher, AuD.
Like others drawn to the hearing health field, Dr. Fisher became an audiologist largely because of early experience with the effects of hearing loss on her family. As a young teen she watched her father struggle with an increased difficulty hearing and communicating. “My father’s hearing didn’t just affect him; it affected our entire family. He missed so much of my life, and it didn’t have to be that way.”
Dr. Fisher was never able to help her father. He died at age 53, while she was in graduate school for audiology. He never saw Hearing Health Center grow into one of the nation’s most respected and prominent hearing practices, nor his daughter become one of America’s most passionate advocates for hearing health, education and patient care.
With five city and suburban offices, Hearing Health Center is Chicago’s premier hearing facility — voted best hearing practice in Illinois three years in a row by Hearing Review Journal.
About 12 years ago, the news came out that doctors and researchers at Johns Hopkins and other top medical schools had proven conclusively that there was a link between hearing loss and cognitive decline.
Further research has shown that people with even minor untreated hearing loss were at twice the risk for dementia.
Dealing with this threat has become an important focus for Dr. Fisher. The first challenging step has been urging people to come in for a free baseline hearing exam to delay and prevent the onset of dementia by catching hearing loss in its earliest stages and providing treatment using hearing aids. “My stated mission is to get everyone over 50 tested,” Dr. Fisher says.
