Events this month by the Miracle-Ear Foundation will give away hearing aids to 100 residents in the Poplar Bluff and Kennett areas.
The Miracle-Ear Mission will be held Aug. 14-15 at the Black River Coliseum in Poplar Bluff and Aug. 17-18 at the Kennett Opera House.
The goal is to serve residents in need, according to organizers.
“It was originally started to help underprivileged children that needed hearing aids that didn’t have access to what they needed,” said Tom Wright, hearing instrument specialist at Miracle-Ear in Poplar Bluff. “A few years later they opened it up to adults. ... Since 1990, there have been over 21,000 children and adults helped get hearing aids. It’s amounted to a little over 40,000 hearing aids.”
The Miracle-Ear Foundation does two mission trips a year, usually in more populated areas like big cities.
“We went and helped out at one in St. Louis a couple of years ago and they just had one last week in Minneapolis — and they had them at the baseball stadiums (in each city),” Wright said. “We did the one in St. Louis at Busch Stadium.
“After we did that, we really wanted to have one down here because we knew there was a need. All five of the offices in our franchise group (in Southeast Missouri) have worked pretty hard helping people in the area get hearing aids through the foundation.”
The Miracle-Ear Mission in Southeast Missouri is a first for this area.
“We do charity work through the mission all the time, but they’ve never actually had a corporate mission trip here (in Southeast Missouri),” Wright said.
Those who are interested can visit the mission’s website at www.missiontohear.org. Once there, they can click on the button that says 2023 Missouri Mission and apply online.
“We’ve got a phone number on there where they can call to set up an appointment time,” Wright said. “That way, we can get people run through without a bunch of people showing up at once and having to wait.”
The event will run from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. both days.
“We’re going to be getting there and start seeing patients between 8:30 and 9 in the morning, and we’re going to be there till at least 5 in the afternoon both days,” Wright said. “We’ll have multiple people doing the testing. For people that haven’t applied (beforehand), they can come in and register. People will help them apply.
“For the people that have went to the website, they can check in. They’ll be taken back and they’ll have their ears looked at. … If they have a medical issue, we can get them a referral to a doctor. If they don’t, they’ll be taken back, tested and fit with hearing aids all in one day.”
Recipients not only will receive free hearing aids, but also free lifetime services to ensure they can maintain their hearing aids.
“The aftercare, which is pretty involved, is free for life — so they don’t ever have to pay for an adjustment,” Wright said. “They don’t have to pay to get their hearing aids cleaned every three months. They don’t have to pay for a yearly hearing test where we check their hearing — and if it’s changed, we reprogram the hearing aids.
“They don’t ever pay for that and that’s good at any Miracle Ear. So if they move to Florida or they’re in California on vacation and they have a problem with their hearing aids, they can go in any Miracle Ear and get taken care of just like they do here.”
Wright enjoys the opportunity to give back and also to help people hear better.
“It’s important to me,” Wright said. “I’ve got a child that’s disabled. The last almost 25 years, helping people with issues and disabilities has just been part of my daily life. But it’s really rewarding. Just in the last month, I fit three kids that range from seven to, I think, 14 (with hearing aids). Just seeing the difference in them or just people in general — it’s nice to have a job where you can go home and know you did some good that day.”