Residents of Portland, Oregon, United States attending the 2024 Health Care Equity Fair downtown were able to have their hearing tested for free, thanks to medical experts who volunteered their time, skill, and services to Adventist Health Portland’s mobile audiology van in October.

“The purpose of the fair was to bring health care to people that typically would not receive it,” said Greg Borgmeyer, Adventist Health Portland’s lead audiologist, who performed the screening tests along with a graduate student assistant who is completing her doctoral degree in audiology at Pacific University.

Screening Tests on Wheels

Early in the morning on event day, Borgmeyer drove the 20-foot (6-meter) audiology van from the hospital in southeast Portland to its assigned spot downtown on the concrete bricks of Pioneer Courthouse Square. The van was soon flanked by dozens of other community partner tents, booths, and mobile units offering free health, skin, vision, and dental screenings, along with showers, hygiene products, haircuts, clothing, food, and related services for people experiencing barriers to care.

The annual outreach event is organized each fall by student and faculty volunteers at Oregon Health & Science University (OHSU), an Adventist Health Portland partner. This year the fair fell on a sunny Sunday and drew large crowds who milled about the square throughout the day. All told, Borgmeyer and his assistant served nearly 20 adults, the majority of whom reside in the downtown area.

“We checked peoples’ ears with otoscopes, looking for any medical issues that may need treatment, like impacted wax, infections, or other factors that could be causing blockages and interfering with hearing,” Borgmeyer explained. “For the hearing tests, people wore headphones and pressed a response button when they heard a tone. The idea was to find out the softest sound they can hear, which is called their threshold of hearing.”

Making a Difference

As expected, test results ran the gamut. Some people had normal hearing, some displayed hearing loss consistent with their age, and some had hearing loss likely linked to the military service they reported. Unique to a downtown population, Borgmeyer says, is the cumulative noise of a busy urban setting.

“There is an issue with loud traffic noise, and people living on the streets can be exposed to it on a 24-hour basis,” he explained. “They may not have access to hearing protection, so it can be a challenging environment for them to preserve their hearing over time.”

At the health fair, Borgmeyer and his assistant gave each person a printed copy of their test results, discussed the findings with them, and offered referrals to appropriate health providers if needed, like to local ear, nose, and throat clinics or hearing aid sources.

“Everyone was so appreciative of us being there and accommodating them,” Borgmeyer said. “One lady had her baby in a stroller, and we were able to bring both of them into the booth. The little one got antsy while Mom was trying to do the test, so my assistant asked if she could hold the baby while Mom finished up the test. She was so grateful that we would go above and beyond to provide that service.”

A Distinctive Option

Adventist Health Portland’s audiology van is one of two custom-designed mobile units that take hearing experts and screening equipment to field sites, usually to large companies where workers are exposed to noise on the job. State law requires that these companies provide and document regular hearing tests for their employees, and the mobile audiology vans have been serving the need in the Portland area for nearly 30 years.

“We have contracts with close to 100 different entities, including the City of Portland, Northwest Natural, Pacific Power, PGE, and numerous other manufacturers and companies in the area,” Borgmeyer said. “We go out with the vans on a daily basis and do testing on-site for their workers. It’s a very niche subset of the audiology profession, and a unique service in a hospital audiology program.”

While the vans are typically reserved for large-scale employee testing, Borgmeyer said, when OHSU contacted him and asked if mobile hearing tests could join the lineup of services at the 2024 Health Care Equity Fair, he immediately agreed.

“It’s just part of giving back to the community,” he said. “If they ask us to come back next year, we’ll say ‘yes’ in a heartbeat.”

The original article was published on the Adventist Health news site.