Can you hear me now? | News - pharostribune.com

Captioned telephones are available at no cost to anyone with hearing impairments who has someone to vouch for their condition.

Referrals may come from a doctor, a hearing care provider, or a veterans service officer, for example.

Captioned telephones look like a regular home phone but have a monitor that looks like a small television screen. The phone quickly transcribes the incoming call into text it displays on the monitor. It also transcribes messages and saves conversations.

The phones have enhanced volume settings that are louder than normal phones. They even have a button that calls customer service directly for help.

Captioned telephones are for those who are deaf, hard of hearing, or late-deafened who communicate by speaking and want to hear as much as they can of what their callers say, but who find it hard to understand what the other person says.

U.S. veterans are one group especially hard hit by hearing impairment. Claims for hearing disabilities are the most frequent claims Mike Spidel, Boone County Veteran’s Service Officer, makes.

“All those old veterans were exposed to machine noise and battle noise, and they all have hearing loss,” he said.

Each theater of operation had its own challenges, but during the Vietnam War, for instance, the men fired large-caliber weapons from loud gunboats without wearing hearing protection. Hearing protection was available, but impractical and made them hotter, Spidel said.

“It was 90 degrees by 6:30 a.m. and 120 degrees by the time the sun came up,” Spidel said.

Vietnam-era veterans are mostly in their 70s now, and many have hearing impairments, he said.

“They may get a phone call from their granddaughter, and they can’t hear what she’s saying,” Spidel said.

He wants every veteran with hearing loss to know all they have to do is call him and okay his forwarding information to the phone provider, CapTel Captioned Telephone. The company has several models and can install them in any home with, or without, internet and at no charge to the veteran.

The Americans with Disabilities Act requires the U.S. government to pay for captioned phone service to the deaf, veterans or not, through the state and federal telecommunications relay service funds.

Money for the funds comes from a few cents added to everyone’s phone bill and itemized as a TRS (telecommunications relay services) charge.

The federal government reimburses phone companies for providing the service and is designed to “ensure that people with hearing loss have equal access to telephone communication,” Stephanie Morrisett, CapTel outreach coordinator, said.

Spidel learned of captioned phones during a spring conference for Indiana’s veterans service officers and partnered with CapTel to ensure Boone County veterans know how to get them.

Morrisett, of Brownsburg, said her grandfather needed a captioned phone for years, but the family didn’t know about them.

“I do this job in honor of my grandpa,” she said. “My focus is on helping people and making sure they have the tools they need to live safely and independently in their homes. My job is to make sure people have access to the program.”

CapTel is a for-profit company and not the only one to offer captioned phones, but it was the original captioned phone, is the only one made in the United States and the only one that provides service to people who do not have internet access, Morrisett said.

Local veterans may call Spidel at 765-483-4480 to request information or a captioned phone.

Others who require captions to effectively use a phone may contact Morrisett by calling 219-644-5056 or emailing to stephanie.morrisett@oeius.org.

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