Sophia Parsons, B.A.
Instructor
[email protected]
I am currently a Clinical Doctorate of Audiology graduate student at Western Washington University in Bellingham, WA and will graduate with my doctoral degree June of 2025. Throughout my experiences both within my program and in my community, I have witnessed first hand the impact that tinnitus can have on a person’s quality of life. In the beginning of my program, I often felt helpless and uncertain of what to tell patients when they told me they had tinnitus. With no gold standard for treating tinnitus, it is easy for patients to venture through ineffective treatment options through scamming or false advertisements. For this reason, I have dedicated most of my personal research into understanding the ins and outs of tinnitus to be better informed for my patients.
I have also practiced mindfulness for years now in my own life, and was ecstatic to find there is promising research that shows behavioral therapies such as mindfulness have a positive outlook for people with tinnitus. To be better educated on the foundations of mindfulness for this course, I completed a 20-hour certified course in mindfulness teaching. I hope to expand on this course in the future and amend it as I go out into the field of audiology, having it help as many people as I can. Feel free to email me your testimonials and thoughts on this course so I can best achieve this.
Being born and raised in the greater Seattle area, I enjoy going out for nature walks (when it is not raining), being active through team sports, cuddling with my two cats, and diving into a good book. I wouldn’t have been able to create this course without the support of my friends, family, and audiology mentors Dr. Anna Diedesch and Ms. Melinda Bryan for believing in my vision. A special thank you to Cindy, for introducing mindfulness into my life and teaching me how to live in the present moment.