Joan and John Calhoun had been dealing with their 2-year-old daughter’s illness for weeks, until a desperate trip to the emergency room uncovered bacterial meningitis. But that was only the beginning of the family’s medical journey 28 years ago.
“A month after Hannah got out of the hospital, we had her hearing tested, and they gave us the diagnosis — profound heading loss in both ears,” Joan said. “All of a sudden, a gut punch and your world changes.”
Today, Hannah Calhoun AuD’20 works as an audiologist for Kaiser Permanente in Oakland, California, where she treats adults and children dealing with some of the same issues she has already faced — hearing loss, cochlear implantation and learning independence.
“I work with the parents of young kids with hearing loss,” Hannah said. “And for parents to see me as an adult who grew up with a cochlear implant, it helps them to see that their kids will be OK.”
She earned her audiology degree from The University of Texas at Dallas’ Callier Center for Communication Disorders in the School of Behavioral and Brain Sciences. The audiology program is ranked third in the nation by U.S. News & World Report.
While coming to terms with their daughter’s disability, the Calhouns were introduced to Callier by their business associates.
“From the beginning, [Callier was] just a world of resources,” said Joan, who is now a Callier Ambassador working to raise awareness for the center. “They gave us positive information about Hannah’s future and what we could expect her to be able to do. We were very fortunate to have access to the services we needed.”
One of those services was the cochlear implant program, where children are followed after they receive the implant that bypasses damaged parts of the ear to stimulate the cochlear nerve with sound. Hannah received a single cochlear implant on her left side in 1996. Soon after, she began speech language therapy, which continued for 10 years while she learned skills for living independently.
“The kids feel a little bit more understood. It normalizes the experience for them a little bit. And I think it gives me more power to relate with parents when they know you’ve gone through what their kid is going through.”
Hannah Calhoun AuD’20
“I don’t remember the illness or having the implant surgery,” Hannah said. “Probably the first thing I remember is speech therapy. We had several therapists, and I remember therapists giving my parents a lot of support and helping them develop a language-rich environment that was so important for my development.”
Cochlear implant recipients must relearn how to hear with the device, which creates more of a robotic sound with different frequencies and tones than normal hearing.
“We spent a lot of time teaching her the sound that letters made, not what the letter is called,” Joan said. “Her therapy and the work we did at home helped her make sense of sound. She had to learn again what the sound for mama was.”
One of the most important skills that Hannah learned was advocating for herself.
“Being able to participate in conversations, I had to advocate for myself, like being able to identify what I missed in conversation and asking questions,” Hannah said. “Speaking up and asking if I can go into a quiet place. And in restaurants, I know which seat I need to sit in for clarity because I only have an implant on the left side, and I want people sitting on that side. In school I took classes in small classrooms when I could and sat as close to the teacher as possible. These are now just subconscious behaviors.”
While attending high school at Ursuline Academy of Dallas, Hannah considered her future. She was accepted at UT Austin and planned to major in physical rehabilitation; however, after volunteering for the Callier Center’s cochlear implant summer camp and speaking to the parents of young campers about her experiences, she changed direction.
“I talked to the parents about what I thought they needed to hear about their kids’ futures, and I was able to show them, through my example, a positive spin on their situation,” Hannah said. “It was really emotional seeing how much those parents needed to hear from someone like me who grew up with a cochlear implant and for them to see what their kids are capable of. That was transformative for me.”
After graduating from UT Austin with a bachelor’s degree in speech, language, and hearing sciences, Hannah began considering graduate programs. Her desire to work with patients helped her choose Callier, which provides some of the best clinical training experiences of any program in the nation.
“I had such a strong tie with Callier from my own experience growing up,” Hannah said. “And I knew that Callier was a strong community that I always felt a part of. I just felt like I belonged there.”
After graduating from UTD, she accepted a position as an audiologist at Christus Children’s hospital in San Antonio, where she worked for two years before joining Kaiser in 2022.
Hannah says an important part of her clinical work is being able to relate to patients who have recently received cochlear implants.
“I know the importance of speech therapy, the importance of parent involvement and a language-rich environment. I know these things from my own perspective,” Hannah said. “The kids feel a little bit more understood. It normalizes the experience for them a little bit. And I think it gives me more power to relate with parents when they know you’ve gone through what their kid is going through.”