She recently decided to open her own office after working for Dr. Terrence Woods as his diagnostic audiologist for seven years and then at McDonough District Hospital for a year in 2004.

“I’ve been building my clientele over the years and decided I’m not getting any younger and now was a good time to make a break,” said Standard. “I felt I had the clientele base to make that move to go on my own.”

She made the decision on her new location on the spur of the moment three weeks ago.

“It was almost serendipitous – we thought we were never going to find one. We were driving around the block to go look at another place and saw the sign in the window here,” she said. “We looked at it that day and signed a contract on it the next.”

She is currently working on her clinical doctorate of audiology or AUD, but anticipates another three or four years due to her work schedule.

Standard offers diagnostic hearing testing and hearing aids, which she said have been revolutionized over the last decade.

“We started doing programmable hearing aids about 10 years ago. About five years ago the digital age hit and we’ve just made progress by leaps and bounds. What we can do with hearing aids now is amazing compared with what I could even do five years ago,” she said. “The digital age now allows us to do things like control for noise; nothing takes it away completely, but we can control for different listening situations. Not only can we fit tiny hearing aids, but tiny hearing aids that are incredibly advanced.”

And it’s the fit Standard believes she can help the most on.

“It’s a prosthetic device – it’s not natural to you; it takes work on your part and work on my part,” she said. “If we both do our job, then nine times out of 10 you’re happy.”

She said hearing disabilities can sneak up on you.

“For most people, hearing loss is a gradual thing. For most people it’s in noisy situations when they really start to notice. When they’re one on one, they don’t have a problem,” said Standard. “When you’re in a group situation and you’re not quite catching everything that’s being said, that could be an indicator that you’re developing some hearing loss.”

Standard anticipates installing a sound booth in one of her back rooms to aid in the diagnosis of hearing disabilities in children and soon plans on making “house calls.”

“One of the things that I want to start is going out to the nursing homes and provide service to the elderly one afternoon a week,” she said, explaining she would stay in the Macomb area. “It’s so hard for them to get out to the office.”

Most of her clientele are referrals from doctors stretching from Industry to Bushnell to Keokuk and others are just by word of mouth.

“They say ‘I got my hearing aid from Chris, why don’t you go see her,’” said Standard.

By Aaron Hintz