For Patients and Parents: What I Saw at LearningRx - A Different Take on Auditory and Cognitive Training

I recently visited the LearningRx center in Chattanooga, Tennessee, a top-rated franchise of their 47 centers. I could have easily gone locally (the closest center is within 23 miles of my home), but it seemed worth the trip, just to meet this particular owner and see what she was doing.

I went not just out of curiosity, but because the owner reached out to me after reading some of my posts about low-gain hearing aids. She wondered whether what I do might help make some of their training more accessible to clients who struggle with auditory processing.

But it wasn’t just the question that drew me in. It was her depth of knowledge, her passion, and the fact that she made sure to introduce me to the research audiologist who helps guide the company’s direction. After speaking with both of them, I realized I couldn’t not go. I might live in the Washington DC area, but I took a plane to Tennessee. I needed to see what they were describing for myself. I needed to know if it was real.

I’ve long been cautious about recommending formal auditory training. Many programs feel too controlled, too polished, and too disconnected from the unpredictable conditions children face in the real world. A few programs (especially one-on-one training methods) seem better than others, but the research is just so mixed … that it’s been very difficult to figure out what might be worthwhile to recommend to my patients. I used to think auditory training might be a waste of time. But after visiting Chattanooga, I’m starting to understand that the most effective programs blend auditory and cognitive training to build lasting skills.

Children and adults were doing cognitively demanding work in an environment that was intentionally not quiet. There were voices, movement, visualization tasks, timers, and real-time interruptions. Coaches would throw out random questions, colors, math problems, all while the learner was in the middle of something else. It wasn’t about memorizing in silence. I could’ve sworn I heard a 10-year-old reciting the names of all the presidents in order. Someone else was playing some sort of a game with different pitches on a tablet. Learning in this chaos was about staying grounded through unpredictability. What they were really working on was resilience, split attention, and emotional control.

The sensory environment was striking. You could hear the steady click of metronomes clicking at different tempos across the room. Sometimes they would briefly line up, syncing in phase, and when that happened, the sound would swell, like sine waves adding together. Computer programs singing musical tones. Trainers and students were speaking across open spaces. The linoleum floors gave everything a light echo, and while there were sound tiles on the walls, they only dampened the sharpest reverberations. The rest of the noise remained, surrounding you in a low-grade hum of unpredictability, with spikes of sound and clicking. Constant clicking.

As a professional audiologist with over 25 years of experience, this was in sharp contrast to anything I had ever seen before. I stood there in shock when I first walked in. Everything I had been taught about auditory environments, controlled, quiet, free from distraction, was turned completely on its head.

And as someone who is also autistic, with ADHD and some sound sensitivity of my own, I honestly couldn’t imagine how anyone could focus in that space. It felt overwhelming… borderline chaotic. But then something unexpected happened. I acclimated. Even I began to tune in to the rhythm beneath the noise. I started to see the structure. I began to understand that the chaos was not random. It was part of the training. And that made it even more interesting.

The work itself was deeply varied. It wasn’t just auditory processing. There were tasks targeting visual processing, math visualization, language skills, memorization, split attention, and emotional regulation. Focus and flexibility were built into everything. The activities constantly changed, and every task felt gamified. There was strategy, pacing, and just enough unpredictability to stretch the learner without breaking them.

I saw children with multiple diagnoses, including intellectual disabilities, as well as older adults working to slow cognitive decline. Some were very young, but others hadn't started until their teens or as adults. Everyone was doing the same kind of work, adjusted for their ability level, but treated with the same expectation that improvement was possible, that the emphasis was on practice, not on scores. That stood out to me. It wasn’t about diagnosis. It was about strengthening function.

And the kids knew it was working. They told me. They spoke with pride about what they had learned and how they had changed. These were kids who, in other settings, might have been written off. But here, they were confident. They saw the difference in themselves.

At one point, I tried following along with their activities myself. Just sitting there, observing, and mentally tracking the steps. I became so cognitively fatigued I nearly fell asleep from sheer exhaustion. That moment hit hard. It made me realize how much effort I expend daily without even noticing.

It also brought up something personal. During the final years of my mother’s life, I watched her slip cognitively, slowly, painfully, and with increasing emotional distress. She had always been sharp, articulate, and driven. But near the end, even simple tasks became overwhelming. I tried everything I could to help her feel stable and clear. But I realize now that I didn’t have the tools. I didn’t know how to help her train her brain, only how to protect it. And I carry the weight of that, not just as a daughter, but as a clinician who wishes she had understood more.

And now I wonder… have we been doing it all wrong?

I’ve always thought of the brain, especially under disability or stress, like an overfilled water balloon. If you could just relieve a little pressure somewhere, everything else would become more manageable. That was my model: make things easier so the person can function better.

But now, I think that metaphor may have been incomplete.

I’ve noticed the same thing in my own hearing aid fittings. In the past few years, I’ve started dialing back the amount of noise reduction I program in. I’ve seen better outcomes that way. Patients are adapting more. They’re learning to work with sound instead of being protected from it.

What I saw at LearningRx echoed that shift. They weren’t increasing noise for the sake of noise. They were increasing unpredictability, and expecting the brain to adapt, track, and recall while under pressure. It wasn’t about memorizing a list. It was about recovering from disruption. Remembering through distraction and holding your thoughts in chaos.

Maybe the brain is more like a suspension bridge than a water balloon. Strengthen one cable, and you lift the entire system. Resilience in one domain gives support to others.

The trainers weren’t audiologists or speech pathologists. They were in-house trained professionals working one-on-one using structured cognitive coaching methods. It isn’t cheap. They have their own research department, with a psychologist, an audiologist, and educators. The owner of the center, Michelle Davis, started our visit by handing me a book of their research, much of which involved third parties. When I asked about generalization, she pulled up a summary of a study showing that kids and adults held on to 98% of what they’d learned, even after 15 months without any more training.

I’ve learned during this trip that I still have a lot to learn. I need to keep my mind open to possibilities outside of my field.

What this company teaches isn’t just auditory. It’s executive function, working memory, processing speed, flexibility, and emotional regulation. It’s not about one isolated skill. It’s about supporting the entire system.

And it left me wondering how we replicate that kind of challenge in a virtual space. Playing background noise might help, but that’s not the same as someone suddenly asking you a math problem while you’re trying to remember a word list. That moment of interruption, that demand for flexibility, is part of what builds the skill. And it’s exactly what most commercial training programs are missing.

They do have internal research showing no significant difference in outcomes between their in-person and virtual models, but I still wonder whether the kind of generalization is different. And for some kids, especially those with autism or high sensory sensitivity, starting virtually might be the better path. The real question is how and when to introduce challenge without overwhelming.

I want to be clear that I have no financial relationship with LearningRx. It’s possible we may end up referring clients to one another in the future, as our work does overlap. But there is no formal or contractual connection, just a shared interest in helping children and adults access sound and learning more effectively.

I’m not saying this model replaces audiology-based training. But it gave me a lot to think about. So much so that I’ve decided to pursue LearningRx training myself and to try it with my AuDHD gifted 12 year-old son and 78 year-old father. Not because I think it’s a cure-all, but because I want to stay open to new ways of supporting listening, learning, and cognitive stamina in the real world. Also, I really appreciate that they offer a trial period of three weeks. We can all give it a try and see how we feel about it before committing financially.

If anyone else here has experience combining cognitive training with auditory support, or has thoughts about building real-world flexibility into virtual models, I’d love to hear from you. Having now seen the benefits, I’m looking forward to exposing myself and my family during training, with a variety of ever-increasing unexpected and annoying background noise!