Arizona Hearing Center - June 2020

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2627 North Third Street, Ste. 100, Phoenix, AZ 85004 | 14418 West Meeker Blvd., Bldg B, Ste. 102, Sun City West, AZ 85375

June 2020

602-277-4327 | www.azhear.com

A Day in the Life

How the COVID-19 Pandemic Is Providing a Valuable Lesson

future of your practice, your patients, and health care. You’re likely confused by daily changes in procedure. You’re frustrated and angry, and you might feel like you are waiting for the next shoe to drop and wondering if you’re missing something everyone else has figured out. As you live day to day and prepare for your life to return to normal, your kids to return to school, and waiting rooms to fill up again, I encourage you to remember how you have felt each day of this pandemic.

This is a strange and difficult time for many of us in the medical community. While many providers are battling COVID-19 or managing care with less staff, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is announcing new guidelines each day. The rules for properly caring for a patient change constantly, and physicians, nurses, and aides are left scrambling to find new ways to cope. Some providers need more ventilators, while others are searching for masks. Some just need enough beds for patients. Then there are providers waiting out the onslaught with empty waiting rooms, preparing for what could come, even if the pandemic hasn’t touched their cities as it has in Washington and New York. Regardless, the patient flow has dropped due to the stay-at-home order, making once normal tests like blood pressure, yearly checkups, and physicals unnecessary. To put it simply, if you are a member of the medical community, you’re stressed. You’re living on the edge, exhausted, and mentally drained. (No wonder "Tiger King" is so popular on Netflix.) You’re worried about the

onslaught can provide a relief they didn’t even know was possible.

As medical providers, we have been given an opportunity to experience the emotional toll disability can take on our patients. It’s exhausting and isolating, but it doesn’t have to be this way. Like this pandemic we are all living in, there is a solution. For the COVID-19 pandemic, it's staying home and avoiding contact. For hearing loss, it’s treating patients with compassion and finding the treatment option that best fills that void and relieves the exhaustion they may have grown so accustomed to.

Ironically, it’s exactly how it feels to be hearing impaired every single day.

Living with hearing loss means constantly battling with the outside world just to understand it. It means worrying about your ability to answer the cashier’s questions or respond appropriately to your waitress. It’s living in fear that you are missing something that everyone else understood. Patients place extra stress on their bodies just to accommodate what their auditory systems cannot pick up. For many people with hearing loss, each day is exhausting. It’s not uncommon for people with hearing loss to comment on how tired they are by midafternoon. They spend their entire day trying to fill in the gaps or muffle the background noise and make sense of what they are being told. Seeking help for this daily

Don’t let this time go to waste, and thank you for your continued dedication to care during this time.

To receive a copy of “Listen Up!” text ListenUp! to 602-899-2260.

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3 Platforms for Competing Online and Crushing Your Fitness Goals GAME ON!

RISK VS. REWARD How to Handle Loss Aversion in Your Business

Through smartphone apps like Words With Friends and 8 Ball Pool, you can compete against your loved ones from virtually anywhere, and creators in the fitness world have taken notice. Now, a number of virtual fitness programs offer the same level of friendly competition along with the satisfaction of completing your fitness goals. Below are three platforms to get you started!

We’re all afraid of loss: loss of revenue, income, customers. We could make an incredibly long list of the things we'd rather not lose. But it’s not just loss. We’re also afraid of the potential of loss, and that fear overrides our desire to gain something. This is loss aversion, a psychological and economic bias that suggests people would rather not lose something than gain something. It’s not uncommon to see traits of loss aversion among business owners and entrepreneurs. However, successful business owners don’t let the thought of loss aversion deter their success and growth; they’ve figured out how to limit it instead. According to Daniel Kahneman, a 2002 Nobel Prize winner for his work in economic sciences, the biggest thing standing between you and overcoming loss aversion is risk. You accept that every decision you make comes with a measure of risk. Sometimes it’s minor; sometimes it’s not. Your goal is to have confidence in your decision-making, which makes it easier to overcome loss aversion.

Virtual Run Events

With all the excitement of a footrace and no crowd to deal with, Virtual Run Events brings 1-mile, 5K, 10K, half-marathon, and full marathon races to you. Racers choose a distance to run around their neighborhood, on the treadmill, or at the park, and their friends and family compete in the very same races wherever they happen to be. As a bonus, proceeds from a number of these events also support nonprofit organizations. Visit VirtualRunEvents.com to sign up for a race and lace up your shoes wherever you are.

DietBet, StepBet, and RunBet

Looking for a little extra motivation to meet your health and fitness goals? Try involving money and a little friendly competition. DietBet, StepBet, and RunBet ask each user to place monetary bets on their ability to achieve various wellness goals. You can also challenge your friends and family to place bets and stay motivated together. All the money is placed into a pot, and when you complete your goal, you get your money back. Some users say they’ve even made a profit! Search for DietBet, StepBet, and RunBet in your app store and get started.

So how do you increase confidence and reduce your risk in any given decision? The answer is data.

Fitocracy

Let’s say you’re developing a new marketing campaign. It’s going to cost you $10,000 to run for a quarter, but you aren’t confident about how it will perform. Ideally, it brings in $100,000 worth of business, but you did minimal research. You just copied someone else’s campaign you read about online. Your first instinct may be to scrap it because you decide it’s not worth the risk. You aren’t confident in the campaign or the results, so it’s best to spend the $10,000 on a safer campaign or aspect of your business. But what if you ignore that first instinct and do your due diligence? You work together with your marketing expert or department to pull relevant data related to your campaign, like demographics, rate of interest, and deals your competitors are offering. Unless the data suggests otherwise, chances are you launch the campaign. It still comes with risk, but you understand the risk. You have data that shows your investment of $10,000 will bring in business. Confidence is key, and confidence comes from information.

Calling all gamers! This is the fitness platform just for you. Invented by gamers, Fitocracy tracks fitness achievements and rewards users as if they were playing a video game. With quests, badges, and multiplayer gaming options, you’ll be motivated to work hard for your goals. Connect with new online friends or invite your loved ones to join you on Fitocracy. It doesn’t get much better than dueling friends or family in a classic one-on- one wellness competition! Learn more at Fitocracy.com.

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5 Words to Control the Conversation Lessons in Communication From Tim Cook

and presented the message he wanted people to focus on: Apple’s record service growth.

In the third quarter of 2019, Apple’s quarterly report showed an unexpected slip in profits. Even iPhone revenue had slipped. But instead of taking a bad hit, Apple’s stocks spiked higher after the report was released. Why? Apple CEO Tim Cook used five magic words. Knowing how to successfully talk about your business is key to continued success. You know your work better than anyone else, so you know if things are going well or if you need to course-correct. However, the outside perspective doesn’t always match the reality of the situation. If someone comes in with concerns or outright anger because of what they think the situation is, you need to reframe the conversation and quickly show them the bigger picture. Tim Cook does this with the simple phrase, “The way I see it …” When addressing concerns about Apple’s dip in profits, Cook took control of the narrative

"The way I see it," Cook said, "we had the strongest hardware portfolio ever. We've got new products on the way. The pipeline is full of great new stuff on the product and the services side. We're very fortunate and have worked very hard to have loyal customers ... The installed base is growing — hit a new record. That's obviously a good thing. And we've got the wearables area that is doing extremely well." Suddenly, investors weren’t worried about the iPhone anymore because Cook reminded them that Apple’s wearables and services alone were close to a Fortune 500 company. Cook provided important context about his company by taking control of the conversation. Controlling the conversation is how leaders steer their teams through stormy weather. They pair their deep

knowledge of the business with effective communication skills so people understand the bigger picture and aren’t hung up on details that only show half the story. Keep in mind that leaders like Cook don’t mislead people with false or exaggerated information. They stick to what’s true while reframing it in a way so outsiders will better understand. If you need to reframe the situation or explain some complicated aspect of your business, start with the magic words: “The way I see it ...”

BE Inspired

PUZZLE

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602-277-4327 | www.azhear.com 2627 N. Third Street, Ste. 100 Phoenix, AZ 85004

2627 N. Thi rd St . , Ste 100 Phoenix, AZ 85004

14418 W. Meeker Blvd. , Bldg B, Ste 102 Sun Ci ty West , AZ 85375

Inside This Edition

1.

What COVID-19 Teaches Us About Hearing Loss

2.

Battle Your Friends and Get Healthier With These 3 Platforms

Minimizing Loss Aversion in Your Business

3.

Communicate Like an Apple CEO

Be Inspired

4.

Harvard’s Tips to Keep Your Brain Young

Keep Your Brain Young 3 Tips for Good Brain Health From Harvard Medical School

rich blood to the region of the brain that is responsible for thought.”

As we age, our bodies change, including our mental functions. Cognitive decline is one of the biggest fears of aging, but it’s not inevitable. Though we’re still learning new things about how our brains work, there’s a lot of scientific research that shows how to keep your brain young. If you want to keep your mind sharp throughout your lifetime, then follow this advice from Harvard Medical School. 1. Get a good workout. Exercising regularly helps all the muscles and organs in your body, even your brain! A good workout can lower your blood pressure and improve your cholesterol levels, which help your brain and your heart. Harvard Health Publishing, a website of Harvard Medical School, also notes that “animals who exercise regularly increase the number of tiny blood vessels that bring oxygen-

2. Pay attention to your mental health. Poor mental health can lead to impaired cognitive function. Chronic anxiety, depression, and exhaustion tend to cause low scores on cognitive function tests. But test scores aren't necessarily a sign of future cognitive decline, and Harvard Health Publishing urges readers to maintain good mental health and get restful sleep, as they are “certainly important goals” for improving cognitive function and overall well-being. 3. Stay connected. It’s not enough to focus on yourself. In order to maintain your long-term cognitive health, you should also focus on your connections with other people. According to Harvard Health Publishing, “Strong social ties have been associated with a lower risk

of dementia, as well as lower blood pressure and longer life expectancy.” Make new friends, stay in touch with family members, and maintain positive relationships in your life. They say an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure. This is certainly true when it comes to your brain health. Do what you can today to protect your mental functions tomorrow.

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