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Title 42 — The Public Health and WelfareRelease 119-73

§285m–1 National Deafness and Other Communication Disorders Program

Title 42 › Chapter CHAPTER 6A— - PUBLIC HEALTH SERVICE › Subchapter SUBCHAPTER III— - NATIONAL RESEARCH INSTITUTES › Part Part C— - Specific Provisions Respecting National Research Institutes › Subpart subpart 13— - national institute on deafness and other communication disorders › § 285m–1

Last updated Apr 6, 2026|Official source

Summary

The Institute's Director, with help from its advisory council, must create a National Deafness and Other Communication Disorders Program and send a written plan to the Director of NIH. The plan must describe how to start, expand, strengthen, and coordinate work on problems affecting hearing (including tinnitus) and other ways people communicate, such as balance, voice, speech, language, taste, and smell. The Director must review and update the plan from time to time and send any changes to the NIH Director. Work under the program must fund and carry out research and clinical work on causes, detection, treatment, prevention, and rehabilitation. That includes basic science in many fields, testing and improving medical and surgical treatments and devices (like hearing aids and implants), preventing and detecting speech and hearing problems and their effects on learning, addressing needs of older adults, studying environmental risks, and building internal clinical and research programs.

Full Legal Text

Title 42, §285m–1

The Public Health and Welfare — Source: USLM XML via OLRC

(a)The Director of the Institute, with the advice of the Institute’s advisory council, shall establish a National Deafness and Other Communication Disorders Program (hereafter in this section referred to as the “Program”). The Director or 11 So in original. Probably should be “of”. the Institute shall, with respect to the Program, prepare and transmit to the Director of NIH a plan to initiate, expand, intensify and coordinate activities of the Institute respecting disorders of hearing (including tinnitus) and other communication processes, including diseases affecting hearing, balance, voice, speech, language, taste, and smell. The plan shall include such comments and recommendations as the Director of the Institute determines appropriate. The Director of the Institute shall periodically review and revise the plan and shall transmit any revisions of the plan to the Director of NIH.
(b)Activities under the Program shall include—
(1)investigation into the etiology, pathology, detection, treatment, and prevention of all forms of disorders of hearing and other communication processes, primarily through the support of basic research in such areas as anatomy, audiology, biochemistry, bioengineering, epidemiology, genetics, immunology, microbiology, molecular biology, the neurosciences, otolaryngology, psychology, pharmacology, physiology, speech and language pathology, and any other scientific disciplines that can contribute important knowledge to the understanding and elimination of disorders of hearing and other communication processes;
(2)research into the evaluation of techniques (including surgical, medical, and behavioral approaches) and devices (including hearing aids, implanted auditory and nonauditory prosthetic devices and other communication aids) used in diagnosis, treatment, rehabilitation, and prevention of disorders of hearing and other communication processes;
(3)research into prevention, and early detection and diagnosis, of hearing loss and speech and language disturbances (including stuttering) and research into preventing the effects of such disorders on learning and learning disabilities with extension of programs for appropriate referral and rehabilitation;
(4)research into the detection, treatment, and prevention of disorders of hearing and other communication processes in the growing elderly population with extension of rehabilitative programs to ensure continued effective communication skills in such population;
(5)research to expand knowledge of the effects of environmental agents that influence hearing or other communication processes; and
(6)developing and facilitating intramural programs on clinical and fundamental aspects of disorders of hearing and all other communication processes.

Legislative History

Notes & Related Subsidiaries

Editorial Notes

Codification Pub. L. 100–553 and Pub. L. 100–607 contained identical provisions enacting this section. See 1988 Amendment note below.

Amendments

1988—Pub. L. 100–690 amended this section to read as if the

Amendments

made by Pub. L. 100–607, which enacted this section, had not been enacted. See Codification note above.

Statutory Notes and Related Subsidiaries

Effective Date

of 1988 AmendmentFor

Effective Date

of amendment by Pub. L. 100–690, see section 2613(b)(1) of Pub. L. 100–690, set out as an Effect of Enactment of Similar Provisions note under section 285m of this title.

Reference

Citations & Metadata

Citation

42 U.S.C. § 285m–1

Title 42 — The Public Health and Welfare

Last Updated

Apr 6, 2026

Release point: 119-73