By Lauren Johnson

Children’s of Alabama ears, nose and throat (ENT) program at Children’s South is seeing roughly 130 patients a day, which has led to the need for expansion. In November 2024, the facility added another audio booth and 10 new examination rooms for patients, bringing the total to five audio booths and 22 rooms.

“Basically, we can run an entire separate physician clinic at the same time now in the same space. That’s almost double the amount of patients that we can see on a daily basis,” said Philp Rosen, MD, a pediatric otolaryngologist at Children’s South. Rosen specializes in hearing loss, chronic ear disease, complex pediatric airway disease and sinus disease. 

The new audio booth and new exam rooms have helped the clinic continue to see patients at a steady pace and prevent longer waiting times.

“The addition of the audio booth is very helpful because that allows us to perform more hearing tests, which we commonly do prior to seeing the physician if they’re coming in for an ear complaint. This helps give the physician more information as far as how severe a problem is. We can also see if there’s something else from that pathology that needs to be addressed,” Rosen said.

The audio booth is an enclosed, soundproof room where physicians can test and evaluate the patient’s hearing. The inside contains toys, a TV screen to direct the child and play different sounds, a seat for the patient and a window for the audiologist to view the patient. The audiologist usually runs the test outside of the booth, but for children under the age of five years, they will stay inside the room to help the child follow commands.

Two common tests the audiologist performs include an audiogram, which tests a patient’s ability to hear different volumes and frequencies, and a tympanogram, which measures the movement of the eardrum. Another type of testing that is used for newborns under the age of six months old is called an auditory brainstem response test (ABR). This test measures the brain and inner ear’s response to sound without requiring the patient to participate.

Rosen and other ENT doctors then use the data from the audiogram, tympanogram or ABR, which are conducted by the audiologist, to determine the next step in treatment.

“I depend a lot on both the audiology team, my nursing team and my clinic staff to effectively take care of patients so that I can spend more time with the patients and families, come up with good decisions for them and counsel them well,” Rosen said.

Rosen has worked at Children’s South for three years and provides surgical and non-surgical treatments for pediatric patients. Common issues he sees include recurrent ear infections, tonsillitis, throat infections, sleep disordered breathing, obstructive sleep apnea, hearing loss, nasal congestion, allergy symptoms, small neck masses, swollen lymph nodes, frequent nosebleeds, chronic sinusitis, swallowing issues and more.

“We’ve recently started working with a device called a hypoglossal nerve stimulator that provides treatment for refractory sleep apnea in patients with down syndrome, which is a common problem for those patients,” Rosen said. “Another thing I provide is ear molding for newborns with mild congenital ear malformations. This is a non-surgical option to help adjust or treat minor to moderate congenital ear malformations to allow the patient to avoid surgery in the future.”

Rosen and the other ENT doctors at Children’s South provide a variety of other treatment options including: ear tube placement for patients with chronic or recurrent ear infection; turbinate ablation for patients with significant nasal congestion, snoring or runny nose; tonsillectomy and adenoidectomy for patients with sleep apnea or sleep disordered breathing symptoms; sinus surgery for patients with chronic sinus issues; nasal cautery procedure for patients with epistaxis or nose bleeds and more.

“We are increasingly seeing more and more patients every year,” Rosen said.

He believes this is partially because there is more awareness about the ENT practice at Children’s South and partially because people are out in the community more in the post COVID-19 era without taking as many precautions to avoid illness.