PEOPLE WITH SPEECH DISABILITIES NOW HAVE A TELEPHONE SERVICE

If you have a speech disability and live in one of the twelve states listed below you can now use a new, free telephone assistance service 24 hours a day. This service, called Speech-to-Speech (STS), provides communications assistants (CAs) for people with difficulty being understood by the public on the telephone.

The FCC recently ruled that STS must be available nationwide in March 2001. STS will be provided through the TTY relay in each state. Unlike TTY, STS enables people with speech disabilities to communicate by voice through a CA as many people with speech disabilities have difficulty typing.

People with speech disabilities can dial toll free to reach a patient, trained CA who is familiar with many speech patterns and has excellent language recognition skills. This CA makes telephone calls for them and repeats their words exactly in a 3-way calling environment.

Every month users make about 6,000 calls nationally. STS is the only way for many people to telephone others not accustomed to their speech. Many STS users have Parkinson's disease, cerebral palsy, multiple sclerosis, or Muscular Dystrophy. Other users stutter or have had a laryngectomy or ALS. STS also helps some speech synthesizer users.

Dr. Bob Segalman has cerebral palsy and developed the concept of STS. Now it makes telephone use much easier for him. To try out STS, report problems or get more information: Call 800-854-7784 and ask for Dr. Bob Segalman (direct #916-263-8689). Or e-mail him at: bob.segalman@worldnet.att.net. See also the STS web site: http://stsnews.com/

Here are the U. S. Speech-to-Speech access numbers:

ARIZONA 1-800-842-6520
MINNESOTA 1-877-627-3848
UTAH 888-346-5822
NEVADA 1-888-326-5658
MARYLAND 1-800-785-5630
WASHINGTON 1 877 833 6341
GEORGIA 1-800-229-5746
WISCONSIN 1 800-833-7637
CALIFORNIA 1-800-854-7784
ILLINOIS 877 526 6690 (California Customer Service 1-800-735-0373)
SOUTH CAROLINA 1-877-735-7277
NORTH CAROLINA 1-877-735-8261

Australia provides STS. Contact: Ace.Tom.McCaul@uq.net.au (Tom McCaul).
Sweden is conducting an STS trial. Contact: Inga.Svanfeldt@tt.hoh.lul.se (Inga Svanfeldt)