About us
Like many Hearing Loss Association Chapters around the US, all meetings of the Albuquerque chapter of HLAA include a hearing loop in the mix of technologies used to make the meetings accessible to those with mild hearing loss all the way to those who are deaf.
Jim Ogle, an engineer from Los Alamo labs began attending the Capter's meetings many years ago and was impressed with the improved clarity and intelligibility he experienced when he first accessed the hearing loop. He became a chapter member and an advocate for hearing loops, joining the chapter's board of directors and encouraging them to sponsor an initiative he suggested naming "Loop New Mexico."
Jim became the chair of the Loop New Mexico Committee and he prepared a handout that was given to chapter members encouraging them to advocate for a loop system at their church. Othet members of the committee we Audiologist Carl Clifford, Shannon Peinado from the Commission for deaf and Hard of Hearing and Steve Frazier, a Hearing Loss Support Specialist and looping advocate who currently still heads the Loop NM initiative. As the old saying goes, the rest is history.
Partnering with a local loop installer named Sally Schwartz, Loop New Mexico played a big role in the spread of the technology throughout the state. To raise awareness of the technology there were many newspaper articles placed by the group over the intervening years along with many power point presentations made to civic groups, churches, adult learning classes, agencies and conferences and elsewhere along with booths being set up at health fairs and other events. Mailings of information brochures on loop/telecoil technology were done to thousands of hard of hearing New Mexicans and also placed in hearing care offices, senior and community centers and libraries. Two all day conferences on the technlogy were organized to familiarize hearing care providers with hearing loops and occasional mailings were sent to them promoting loops and sharing news on the technology for those who might have missed it. Samples of the latest versions, suitable for downloading and printing on a home computer and printer can be found here.
As the initiative grew it caught the attention of the national office of the Hearing Loss Association of America (HLAA) and in 2012, after initiating their own looping campaign entitled Get in the Hearing Loop (GITHL), HLAA awarded Loop NM the first ever "Get in the Hearing Loop Award."
In addition to the national exposure of HLAA's GITHL campaign, there are now over two dozen HLAA chapters and state organizations conducting their own looping campaigns and even more being run independently by other hearing loss or loop advocacy organizations including a national campaign by the country's many Sertoma clubs.
Loop New Mexico was spun off by the Albuquerque HLAA chapter in 2018 and is now an independent entity devoted to advocacy for and education about hearing loops.
We do not sell or install hearing loops. New Mexico firms known to be familiar with the technology are listed a here.
