| 9/26/2009 6:00:00 AM | Email this article • Print this article | Biard hears call of needy
Audiologist specializing in pediatrics travels to Pacific island to help poor
Kimberly Benedict
Journal Staff Writer
Imagine being a child living in a world without sound. No music from an ice cream truck, no words of love or comfort from your mother, no laughter from your friends, just silence. For many children, that world is their reality. For Janae Biard, that world is her calling.
Biard, a Cortez native who just recently moved back to the area, is an audiologist and speech pathologist who specializes in pediatrics. This past summer, Biard was able to take the gift of sound to Chuuk, an island group in the southwestern part of the Pacific Ocean, part of the Federated States of Micronesia.
At home, Biard works mostly with cochlear implants in severely to profoundly hearing impaired individuals.
"A cochlear implant is a device that allows individuals to have access to the sounds of speech," Biard said. "For kids it is great because it gives them access. With the audiologist part of my training I help them make sense of the sound. With the speech therapist part I hopefully teach them to speak."
While working in San Diego, Calif., Biard was contacted by doctors who were traveling to Chuuk as part of a medical mission team for Canvasback Missions, a Seventh Day Adventist missions organization based in Benicia, Calif. The team was in need of a pediatric specialist, and Biard jumped at the opportunity.
"I've always wanted to do a humanitarian mission trip," she said. "It came at a great time, and the funding was provided. Canvasback paid for the trip. It was an opportunity to help people who otherwise wouldn't have the medical care."
Biard and the ear, nose and throat specialty team, including three doctors, two nurses, an anesthesiologist and two audiologists, traveled for two days to arrive at the island where they would base their clinic. Once they arrived, they were faced with the overwhelming need of the people they encountered.
"It's a very poor area," Biard said. "It was really amazingly shocking to me."
The systemic poverty in the region creates many problems, including a lack of overall medical care and the near nonexistence of specialty care.
"The only care hearing-impaired people in the region have is an audiologist who comes in from Guam," Biard said. "Sometimes they aren't seen for years. Many of them had hearing aids that were broken or had no batteries, or they lost the aid - problems you wouldn't see in the U.S."
The team immediately went to work, aided by the triage work those at the local hospital had done before the Americans arrived.
"What was really great about our services is that we collaborated with a local hospital," Biard said. "They knew who needed to see us before we ever got there. Those local physicians, who do everything they can for the community, had them ready for us."
Each member of the team had their own area of specialty.
"My role was to do the diagnostic evaluation of these people before they saw the surgeons," Biard said. "We also fit hearing aids on some kids and adults."
According to a press release from Canvasback, the team examined more than 325 patients, fit 41 patients for hearing aids, provided 227 major procedures, which included 58 major surgical procedures ranging from thyroid to total ear reconstruction and nasal reconstruction and 116 minor procedures.
The team faced a variety of hardships along the way, including an extreme lack of water and an unpredictable electricity supply.
For Biard, the hardest part of the trip was coming face to face with individuals who were struggling with disabilities or diseases that technology, medication or therapy could easily address.
"Here, every community has early intervention services and person who are designated and knowledgeable to deal with these problems," she said. "There, we found six deaf kids - 6-, 9-, 18-year-olds - who had no language at all. It was really shocking and sad to me. They should have had adult-type language skills, and they have nothing."
Biard was able to meet with the preschool teacher on the island and provide her with information on sign language, in hope of providing communication skills to the children and their families. It is was important to her to be able to provide the community with that opportunity, she said.
The team, including Biard, plans to go back to the Chuuk area next June. While they might not be on the same island, there is no doubt they will be able to make just as large an impact; although for the team, it is never enough.
"You are always grateful for what you can do," Biard said. "But you always wish you could do more."
For more information about Canvasback Missions, visit the Web sit at www.canvasback.org or call (800) 793-7245.
Reach Kimberly Benedict at kimberlyb@cortezjournal.com.
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Reader Comments
Posted: Tuesday, September 29, 2009
Article comment by:
Jef Field
Being a former Montezuma-Cortez High School teacher and coach. I worker with Janae as her softball coach. This type of care and generosity for others was evident when she was one of my players. Janae was always such a joy to be around and it is apparent that she has continued her positivity and passion into her chosen career. Congratulations Janae on your success as an adult and your generosity as a person!
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