Estafany is thankful for receiving the gift of hearing from Oticon Medical and Ear Community

Estafany Martinez Hernandez, 8 years old of South Carolina, with her two newly donated Oticon Medical Ponto 3 Superpower hearing devices

Ear Community is thrilled to introduce you to Estefany Martinez Hernandez, an 8 year old little beauty who lives with her mother in South Carolina.  Earlier this year, Estefany moved to the United States from Honduras and has had an uphill battle ever since. Estefany was born with bilateral Microtia and Atresia as well as a cleft palate (which has since been repaired).  Her first language is Spanish, and after moving to South Carolina, she was thrown into school where only English is spoken. She has struggled with the language barrier all without equal access to sound! Still, Estefany perseveres and is able to get access to language through her mother, they sit very close together and Estefany reads her mother’s lips.

In the Spring of 2018, Estefany’s situation was brought to the attention of Dr. Dorothy Saxon, who works with Estafany’s school district. Dr. Saxon had been to an Educational Audiology Association conference in Arizona where Melissa Tumblin presented about Microtia and Atresia as well as Ear Community.  Naturally, when Estefany walked into Dr. Saxon’s life, she immediately thought of Ear Community. Dr. Saxon reached out to Melissa and it quickly became apparent that Ear Community can and should help Estefany get access to sound.

After a unanimous vote from our Ear Community Board of Directors, Estefany was granted a donation of two brand new Oticon Medical Ponto 3 Superpower processors for her journey towards sound could begin!  It has been a long, and bumpy road – between finding interpreters for Estefany’s sweet mother who speaks only Spanish, and getting schedules to coincide so that the fitting could take place.  Amazingly, and just in time for National Microtia Awareness Day, Estefany received her two Oticon Medical Ponto 3 Superpower processors on November 7th.  Estefany absolutely loves her new devices, and some of her first words after having them fitted were, “Thank you for my new sound!”  

A very special thank you to Alan Raffauf, Vice President of Marketing and Operations for Oticon Medical US, for choosing to donate the new Oticon Medical Ponto 3 Superpower hearing devices to Ear Community so that they could be donated to Estefany to help her hear better from here on out. Thank you to Beverly Ostrowski, Director of Customer Service, with Oticon Medical for helping get Estefany’s hearing devices to her so quickly, and a very special thank you to Dr. Dorothy Saxon for her tireless efforts to help Estefany hear.  Thank you for everyone’s support and for helping Ear Community continue with its mission of helping individuals with Microtia and Atresia. Oticon Medical believes in helping individuals with hearing loss so that they can live a better quality of life. Oticon Medical is a well-respected international hearing device manufacturer that is a part of the “William Demant Group [which has] 100-plus years of experience in audiology and sound processing and established manufacturing and logistics infrastructure.”

We are so grateful to be a part of Estefany’s journey, and cannot wait to see all that she accomplishes now that she has access to sound.  Welcome to the United States, and welcome to the Ear Community family, we wish you all the very best from this world!
Thank you!
Ear Community
www.EarCommunity.org