Medicine: Mobilized for Hearing

Barbara Healey, 10, of Patchogue, N.Y. had almost complete loss of hearing in her left ear and considerable loss in the right as a result of a fall downstairs at the age of 1½. She had to have special training in both speech and hearing. When Manhattan's Otolaryngologist J. Douglas Lake was consulted, he decided to do a difficult and delicate operation called mobilization of the stapes (small bones of the inner ear). For realignment, the ¼-inch (or shorter) bones had to be magnified 16 times under a new type of Zeiss lens. Last week Barbara was home again, enjoying Christmas carols clearly for the first time, and hearing—instead of merely feeling the vibrations—as her black kitten purred in her lap.