Invited Speakers

Kathleen Cienkowski

Dr. Kathleen Cienkowski is the Department Head in the Department of Speech, Language, and Hearing Sciences at the University of Connecticut. She also serves as the UConn LEND Audiology Discipline Coordinator, where she mentors interdisciplinary trainees and promotes leadership in services for individuals with disabilities. Her research focuses on comprehensive aural rehabilitation across the lifespan, with an emphasis on improving communication, participation, and quality of life for individuals with hearing loss. Her current work examines factors influencing successful hearing device use, including health literacy, patient-centered care, and listening effort. She also has a growing interest in community-engaged learning, integrating partnerships with community organizations into audiology education to enhance student learning while addressing the needs of individuals with hearing loss and their families.

Shari Eberts

Shari Eberts is a passionate advocate for hearing health. She is the founder of Living with Hearing Loss, a popular blog and online community for people with hearing loss, and an executive producer of We Hear You, an award-winning documentary about the hearing loss experience. Her co-authored book, Hear & Beyond: Live Skillfully with Hearing Loss, is the ultimate survival guide to living well with hearing loss. Shari has an adult-onset genetic hearing loss and hopes that by sharing her story, she will help others to live more peacefully with their own hearing issues. Visit her at LivingWithHearingLoss.com.

Keith Darrow

Keith N. Darrow, Ph.D., CCC-A is a neuroscientist, clinical audiologist, educator, and author whose work focuses on the relationship among hearing loss, cognitive health, and healthy aging. He completed his clinical and research training at Harvard Medical School and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and spent nearly a decade conducting research and at the Massachusetts Eye and Ear.

Dr. Darrow is a Professor at Worcester State University and serves as Director of Treatment for Hearing & Brain Centers of America. He is also the founder of Excellence in Audiology and co-founder of AuDExperts, through which he has helped hundreds of hearing healthcare practices expand their approach beyond audibility to include cognition, communication, wellness, and patient-centered rehabilitation.

His clinical and educational work emphasizes the importance of early, evidence-based treatment of hearing loss and tinnitus, routine cognitive screening, and the integration of cognitive wellness and healthy aging strategies into adult aural rehabilitation. He has developed programs that actively engage patients in hearing treatment, cognitive rehabilitation, social connection, physical activity, and other modifiable lifestyle factors associated with brain health.

Dr. Darrow is the author of several books on hearing loss, tinnitus, cognition, and dementia prevention and is a nationally recognized speaker on the role of hearing healthcare in supporting communication, independence, quality of life, and long-term cognitive health.