March 28, 2024

Hometown Hearing opens to meet local need

Helping people hear what matters. That is the goal of the new hearing clinic, Hometown Hearing, and its owner Jacob Levsen. The business at 118 First St. N. opens Monday.

“My focus, my goal is to be their contact person — to be the person who helps them. When they call, they are going to talk to me, when they come into the office they are going to see me. So they have that one-on-one contact all of the time,” Levsen said.

A Quad Cities-area native, Levsen moved to Arizona upon graduation. There he met his wife, who encouraged the move back to Iowa.

“My wife fell in love with Iowa. She loved the change of the seasons,” Levsen said.

During that time, he became interested in helping people hear and began work to become certified.

“To just become a hearing specialist, it is a journeyman program. I worked with a licensed professional for right around a year, then took the state licensing exam,” Levsen said. “Then three years into my license, I could go and take a board certification course and testing. I did that and became a board certified specialist.”

Levsen did his research after moving back to Iowa to find a good location for his hearing clinic. After working with the chamber of commerce, he learned about what the community of Newton needed and what the goals of the community are and found that Newton had a real need for his services.

“When I was looking at different places around the Des Moines area, I work around with different manufacturers and companies around Iowa, when I was looking at it Newton was very underserved. For the most part, people have to go into Des Moines to have anything done with their hearing aids, so I wanted to be able to offer the service here in town so people wouldn’t have to commute so far,” Levsen said.

At Hometown Hearing, Levsen will offer ear cleanings and auto-metric testing along with speech and tone testing. He will also do extensive work with hearing aids including fittings, counseling, adjustments and repairing.

His services are for those 18 and older, and he suggests people start testing their hearing after turning 30.

“Most people should have their hearing tested by the time they are in the 30s. Then monitor it on a semi-regular basis until they are at least 65. Then when they are 65 they should have it tested yearly,” Levsen said.

Levsen currently lives in Pleasant Hill, but may potentially move to Newton once his business gets up and running. He hopes, through his business, to have a positive impact in the city and help the movement to get people in town.

“That is something that I want to be a big part of. I want to be part of the community and promote the community and hopefully, bring more people out here. That is part of my goal of what I am doing, too, and support Newton as much as I can,” Levson said.

Levsen will be open during the week from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. He said anyone is welcome to stop in for a cupcake, baked by his wife, or to give him a call if they need assistance.

“I will be running around a lot to introduce myself and talk to people. I do a lot of outreach, I’ll be over at the retirement communities and different things, so it is best to call me. The number is a mobile number, it is best to just give me a call, because I am here but I’m just not in the office,” Levson said.

For now, while still getting up and running, Levsen will offer assistance with hearing aids and general cleaning. He will begin testing in the next week and after the holiday is planning on having a grand opening. You might even be able to meet his youngest assistant.

“My 8-year-old comes in all of the time and loves ears and people. She can run the audiometer and she gives me hearing tests, it’s pretty neat,” Levson said.

For more information, contact Levsen at 641-840-2240.