I'm so glad that I'm here. I love the community and I'm just really excited to give back in a new way.”

Dr. Rachel Allgor

2009 Hastings graduate Dr. Rachel Allgor recently opened Journey Audiology and Hearing Care inside the Petterson Chiropractic building located at 825 Bahls Drive, suite 200. Journey Audiology offers a variety of services to improve hearing health for their patients.

“I've always loved Hastings forever. I am a third-generation Hastings graduate. So, I knew that I wanted to come back to the city in some way, shape or form, and when I was starting up the practice, I was like, oh, I need to go to Hastings. This is where I need to be. Then everything just fell in place to make it work and make it easy to come back. I'm so glad that I'm here. I love the community and I'm just really excited to give back in a new way,” she said.

Dr. Allgor has a hearing loss, and she wears a hearing aid daily in her right ear. Her mom was a deaf/hard of hearing teacher, so she has been around the process of audiology her entire life. Those personal experiences guided her path to where she is now. Dr. Allgor went to grad school in Arizona to receive her degree and because of the heat, she came back to Minnesota as fast as she could.

Upon her return, she worked at a private practice in Edina for six years before opening Journey Audiology and Hearing Care in Hastings. She found the office space inside Petterson Chiropractic thanks to a friend.

“I walked in, and Dr. Chad and Deanna were able to talk with me then and there, and I was like, oh, this space is perfect. I could not ask for a more beautiful building or better people to work with either. So, this has been just kind of a dream. But I started the whole process probably last fall, and then really kicked things into gear in about July,” added Dr. Allgor.

The office space has two different rooms in use. One is the office for consultation and general office work, and the other room is set up with a sound booth, an important aspect to understanding the needs of the patient.

“The really fun thing with a test booth like this is it is sound treated. As soon as you walk in, you can tell the difference. It feels different when you're in there. To have a test that's done in a sound booth like this you know it is going to be accurate. I will be getting credentialed with the VA to be able to do community care things and that does require a booth, I have that here for those purposes. I can do hearing tests, I can fit hearing aids, I do a lot of custom hearing protection, too. So, if you're a musician who wants to just protect your hearing because it's important to you, then we don't have to cut off all of the sound. We filter certain frequencies more than others that way. I also do a lot of tinnitus work and I have a specialty in that so if there's ringing in the ears, chirping, chiming, buzzing, whatever it might be, there are things we can do to help,” she explained.

To learn more about Journey Audiology and Hearing Care, give Dr. Allgor a call at 651-661-4600 or visit www.journeyaudiology.com.