For press information, contact Sara Davis or Margaret McMullen at 901-678-5800

Each year, graduate students in the University of Memphis’ School of Audiology and Speech-Language Pathology organize and sponsor the Mid-South Conference on Communicative Disorders. The 39th annual conference will be held Fed. 26-27 at the Hilton Memphis, 939 Ridge Lake Blvd., with more than 750 audiologists and speech-language pathologists attending.

The conference will feature information on current research, theories, and clinical techniques in the field. The strong clinical focus of the conference attracts practicing professionals from throughout the United States, as well as graduate and undergraduate students in the field of communication sciences and disorders.  It is the oldest and largest student-sponsored conference in the nation.

Dr. Joel Kahane, professor in the School of Audiology and Speech-Language Pathology, will give the keynote speech on Friday, February 27, at 12:15 p.m. He will discuss “Our Role-Our Purpose.”  Kahane also is a clinical associate professor of otolaryngology and head-neck surgery at the University of Tennessee Health Science Center and is involved in craniofacial clinics and head-neck cancer programs in the Mid-South.

Among the presenters are Karen Markuson Ditty, a pediatric audiologist and former director of audiology and speech pathology at Woman’s Hospital in Baton Rouge, La., where she initiated universal hearing screening; Walter H. Manning, professor and associate dean of the School of Audiology and Speech-Language Pathology at the U of M and a specialist in fluency disorders; and Lincoln Gray, professor of communication sciences and disorders at James Madison University. Gray’s research focuses on hearing loss as a public health problem.

The event is sponsored by the U of M chapter of the National Student Speech-Language Hearing Association.

More information is available by phone at 901-678-5800 or online at http://www.memphis.edu/csd/nsslha/conference.htm