Learning to find your voice and use it after living most of your life in silence is not something that can be done overnight, or without the support, compassion and determination of others.

After about six years of practice both in and out of the classroom, through hours of individual instruction and hard work, 17-year-old Danny Teresi, a non-verbal student currently residing at Matheny Medical and Educational Center in Peapack, NJ, has found his voice.

Danny is able to communicate his thoughts and feelings to those around him for the first time in his life.

Danny’s strength, drive and perseverance, along with that of the Matheny staff, has allowed a once-silent young man to exchange pleasantries, ask questions and express himself with words.

Perseverance is commonplace at Matheny
Founded in 1946, the Matheny Medical and Educational Center is a special hospital for children and adults with medically complex developmental disabilities. Insured with Princeton Insurance for the past 23 years, the facility also serves as a special education school providing academics, combined with functional life skills, for students, ages 3-21, a comprehensive outpatient center meeting the healthcare needs of people with all types of disabilities in the community and a teaching hospital developing ways to train healthcare professionals, therapists and educators in how to work with persons who have developmental disabilities.

Matheny’s activities in spreading awareness, aiding school districts and offering outstanding patient care to people with disabilities from 12 counties throughout the state resounds with staff members at Princeton Insurance.

“What Matheny does day in and day out is nothing short of remarkable,” said Princeton Insurance Vice President of Underwriting and Marketing/Communications Lois Hogya. “Aside from providing excellent health services to those living in New Jersey with disabilities, they give their patients the opportunity to communicate when no one else could. Princeton Insurance is privileged to partner with a facility that is so important to the people of New Jersey.”

Matheny’s Medical Director, Dr. Gary E. Eddey, commented that knowing Princeton Insurance stands behind them has enabled the school medical team to remain focused solely on patients and dedicated to carrying out their mission.

"Matheny Medical and Educational Center has partnered with Princeton Insurance since 1985, and the relationship has been an extremely beneficial one," said Dr. Eddey.

Small beginnings
Of the 67 students currently enrolled in the Matheny School, the majority of whom are non-verbal, Danny was considered one of the more advanced, and therefore ready to take his communication lessons to the next level.

At first, staff at the school discovered that Danny was able to express himself by using a manual communication board. He would eye gaze at a particular picture on the board to convey his thoughts.

Through this interaction, Danny’s therapists realized that he was exhibiting not only good language skills, but strong cognition, a great deal of motivation and a lot of maturity - especially given his age.

So in 2004, at the age of 14, Danny received his first training session on how to use a complex communication device called a Dynavox.

On a screen mounted atop Danny’s wheelchair tray, the Dynavox features a programmed language system that was designed for direct selection. This means that various icons with labels and images are in constant rotation, which is called “auto scanning.” Using a button that is mounted to the left of his headrest, Danny selects the item he wants when it’s highlighted by pressing the button with his forehead. Once a category has been selected, further options appear for Danny from which he can choose.

One icon on Danny’s Dynavox says “people,” and when he clicks on it, a menu of icons appears showing people’s names and pictures, including his family members, teachers and friends. So if he wanted to make a comment about a particular teacher, he would select that teacher’s icon. The Dynavox would then speak that teacher’s name using an electronically generated voice.

While Danny’s ability to communicate seems effortless to people meeting him for the first time, it actually took a great collaborative effort among multiple staff members at Matheny, years of dedication, ongoing training and education to achieve.

A personalized device
The Dynavox itself was designed only with Danny in mind. Christine Mayercik, speech language pathologist at Matheny, has been working with Danny for many years and helped to customize the tool for him.

“The tool is designed to fit his needs as they change,” explained Christine. “I worked with the Occupational Therapy Department to develop the level of access and the access site. We had to determine if Danny was best suited to control the device with his foot, head or hand.”

She said that even after deciding Danny had best control using his head, they then had to determine if the button would be better for Danny on the right side or left side, or in a higher or lower position. They also considered using an optical sensor, involving head gear with a laser pointer that he could use to point at the screen, but the button seemed to be the best option.

“There are other communication tools that are not as advanced as this one,” said Christine, “but we knew Danny was ready for a more sophisticated device. This particular Dynavox holds an amazing amount of memory.”

She said Danny started with only eight icons on a page. Today there are 20.

Christine assisted in creating the pages in Danny’s Dynavox for each individual academic area as well as specialty areas. There are pages for language arts, math, science, social studies and Spanish. He also has a career page that enables him to do interviews, in addition to social and leisure pages.

If you ask Danny how old he is, Danny waits for the auto scan to highlight the icon titled “math.” He then selects “numbers,” and from there, he selects a one and a seven in order to say “17.”

<continue reading Danny's story...>