Collette Ramsey Baker, Founder
Hearing Health Foundation (HHF) was founded as the Deafness Research Foundation in 1958 because of the vision, strength, and determination of one remarkable woman, Collette Ramsey Baker.
After living with substantial hearing loss for many years, at age 35 an early fenestration operation completely restored Mrs. Ramsey Baker’s hearing. In gratitude, she sought to support hearing and balance research, to donate money to a national non-profit organization, but none existed. That was when she decided to create a non-profit that could support medical research to further hearing loss treatments, prevention, and cures.
Under her leadership, HHF bestowed grants upon colleges and other research institutions for research and improvement of hearing. Mrs. Ramsey Baker received letters of commendation from many renowned leaders, including Presidents Herbert Hoover and Dwight D. Eisenhower, as well as Helen Keller and Cardinal Francis Spellman. She was also listed in Who’s Who for Women.
Today, HHF celebrates the legacy of Mrs. Ramsey Baker by funding groundbreaking research that will improve the lives of people afflicted by hearing and balance conditions. Our Board of Directors regularly presents the Collette Ramsey Baker Leadership Award to one individual for demonstrating an exceptional commitment to the life-changing scientific work of HHF, and our Collette Ramsey Baker Society acknowledges and thanks supporters who have made a planned gift to HHF through their wills.
Research Milestones
Since 1958, HHF has made incredible breakthroughs in research and care.
HHF created the National Temporal Bone Banks Program, to collect and study the human temporal bone. Temporal bones encompass each ear within the skull. They protect the part of the brain that controls hearing, speech, memory, and behavior.
HHF supported research that led to the development of cochlear implants: devices with a magnetic internal coil and ear-worn, outside processors. They help individuals who show little to no benefit from hearing aids.
HHF supported research that led to the advanced understanding of how sensory cells transmit information to the brain.
HHF funded research that led to an understanding of outer hair cell motility and otoacoustic emissions, which led to a new method for measuring the health of a newborn’s ear at birth.
Researchers who had been funded by HHF discovered that inner ear hair cell restoration is possible in birds and fish.
HHF funded research that led to the establishment of adeno-associated virus (AAV) as a safe vector for future gene therapy treatments.
HHF supported the establishment of Universal Newborn Hearing Screening legislation to ensure babies nationwide are tested for hearing loss at birth. The percentage of babies tested jumps from under 5 percent in the early 1990s to over 98 percent today.
HHF formed the Hearing Restoration Project (HRP) as the first international research consortium focused on investigating hair cell regeneration as a cure for hearing loss and tinnitus.
HRP researchers discovered that inner ear hair cell regeneration is present in the neonatal mouse auditory system and in the adult mouse’s vestibular (balance) system.
HHF funded research that found a rare genetic variant leads to a greater susceptibility for middle ear infection, which affect up to three-quarters of children by age 3, half of them repeatedly, with complications leading to temporary or permanent hearing loss.
HHF researchers continue to advance diagnostic methods and treatments for tinnitus, Ménière's disease, Usher syndrome, auditory processing disorders, and hyperacusis through the Emerging Research Grants program.
Researchers funded by HHF went on to work on teams behind the first successful use of gene therapy, delivered via AAV, to reverse a genetic hearing loss caused by a single gene.