From left to right: Back row – Casey Dillon, Kaylynn Oliver, and Sharra Shores; Front row -Joanne Dillon
by Vickie Holt
New River Valley Hearing, Inc. was founded by Audiologist, Joanne Dillon, through a passion for making her community hear and understand well.
Born and raised in Roanoke, Joanne grew up and went to school in the Hanging Rock area. At the time of her high school graduation, she still had no idea what she was going to do. The only thing she knew for sure is that working in restaurants for the rest of her life didn’t sound fun.
To get herself started in some direction, Joanne got a job designing kitchens for Quality Kitchens in Roanoke and enrolled at Hollins College. There, she received a Bachelor of Arts degree in Psychology in 1988.
Even though she had received her degree, and even though she had loved the Psychology courses, Joanne just wasn’t sure she wanted to pursue it further. After all, she had a pretty good job with Quality Kitchens. It had paid her way through school and was allowing her to live comfortably on her own.
That is, until Quality Kitchens went out of business.
Not to worry, though. Joanne quickly found another job with a kitchen remodeling supply company at Smith Mountain Lake. Soon afterward, however, she was diagnosed with juvenile diabetes at the age of twenty-five. The diagnosis had come as a shock, out of the blue.
“It was a setback,” says Joanne, “but I picked myself up and kept going.”
For the next ten years, Joanne’s life would be one that many could relate to. She met and married her husband, Virgil Dillon. The two made a home in Smith Mountain Lake, and pretty much got on with life. They even started a family.
When she was nine months pregnant, however, Joanne was abruptly let go from the kitchen remodeling supply company. Suddenly facing joblessness with a new baby at home, she admits to feeling lost. She didn’t know what to do or in which direction to turn. She tried for a long time to find another job, then one day ran across some information about Speech Language Pathology and Audiology.
It had been a decade since she’d been in a classroom, but something told Joanne this was the right path. She looked around for schools that had a master’s program in Audiology and found that the closest one was in Radford. She applied and was accepted but was told she’d need a second bachelor’s degree before moving into the master’s program. Unfortunately, the Psychology degree from Hollins was not sufficient to progress further.
During the next years of her life, Joanne dedicated herself to getting those degrees. It was a ninety-minute drive from her home in Smith Mountain Lake to college in Radford, but the commute was worth it. Once she’d started in on the new courses, she fell in love with Audiology and thought, “this is what I want to do.”
For years, Joanne kept up a hectic schedule that included home life, two more children, three hours commute each day, and classes. “I lived in my car’”, says Joanne. “I studied in my car.”
Halfway through her mission, Joanne got a second Bachelor of Arts degree in Communication Sciences and Disorders with a 3.9 grade point average, then threw herself into the master’s program. She wanted it bad. In the end, she achieved her goal in 2000; a Master of Science degree in Audiology with a 3.8 grade point average. A degree, Joanne tells us, that is no longer available. To become an Audiologist now, a student must achieve a doctorate.
The journey to setting up her own practice, however, was just beginning. Following graduation, she did an internship at the office of ear, nose, and throat specialist, Doctor Bishop. “He was a kind and caring doctor,” says Joanne. “He was the kind that loved people and didn’t charge too much. I learned a lot from him.”
Her second internship was with the VA Hospital in Salem. The position didn’t pay, but she continued learning a lot in her time there. It was rewarding and fulfilling, and Joanne tells us she still sees some of the veterans she had met there.
The next step on her journey was to find a clinical fellowship but was unable to find that kind of supervised position for almost a year. Suddenly, however, three positions opened at once. She interviewed for all three and ended up back in the office of Doctor Bishop where she worked for the next eight years.
During this time, she was also working as adjunct professor for Radford University’s Communication Sciences and Disorders department while seeing patients at the university’s Waldron College of Health Sciences. While in her position at Radford University, she also supervised graduate students’ clinical experiences.
It was a hectic eight years. She was spending eight hours a day at Doctor Bishop’s and time at Radford University, all while maintaining her home and family life, raising three children. She loved the practice and loved the people. Doctor Bishop was well loved in the community, but with sixty to eighty patients a day, it was becoming too much. There was no internet at the time, and no modern technology to make it easier. She was beginning to think she needed to do something different.
It was a thought that remained on her mind for the last two years of her time with Doctor Bishop, but she ultimately came to her limit.
An engineering firm from Blacksburg had approached her about a special project they’d been working on for the Department of Defense. Better hearing protection was needed for the crews aboard aircraft carriers, and all the other Audiologists they had tried thus far had failed.
At the time, she replied that she was opening her own practice, but they tracked her down months later and asked again. This time, she agreed. The year was 2008.
Even though she’d already opened her practice, for the next four years of her life, Audiologist Joanne Dillon was the supervisor for a tiger team whose job it was to make thousands of ear impressions for aircraft carrier crews in the waters off both the east and west coasts of America. “It was exciting,” says Joanne, “and it was different. I had to learn a lot and had to do a lot, but I got to go to lots of amazing places.”
The project involved a lot of travel and it was a huge undertaking, but in the end was worth it. Having already worked at the VA Hospital, Joanne knew how big a problem hearing loss was among veterans. The work she did with the defense project would hopefully take some part in helping future generations of veterans from suffering as their predecessors had. “It was great money,” she says. “But it also served a great purpose.”
All the time at Radford University, earning her degrees. All the time spent working the internships. The time spent working the fellowship, being an adjunct, and helping our service men and women. She had done her diligence and she had done her duty. Finally, it was time for Joanne to concentrate on her practice.
NRV Hearing was established in October of 2008 at 616 West Main Street, Suite G, in Radford, with a second branch opening in May of 2015 at 1482 Floyd Highway, South, in Floyd. Joanne is the sole provider for both Audiology clinics and it is through a lot of planning and precision that she is able to take patients in both locations. She is also continuing her education by working toward her doctorate in Audiology online through the University of Florida at Gainsville.
Helping her is her daughter, Casey Dillon, who is a certified Audiology Assistant. As Joanne explains, because a doctorate is now required to become an Audiologist, America has a shortage of Audiologists compared to the population. This makes Audiology Assistants vital to the field. Casey Dillon, as well as Kaylynn Oliver, both received their certifications through the Audiology Academy; a program that is highly praised by Joanne.
In addition to performing exams, Casey and Kaylynn are educated in the devices produced by most major hearing aid manufacturers and are experienced in instrument troubleshooting and maintenance. They can do cleaning, replacing filters, and ordering, as well as sending hearing aids off to be repaired. One of the few things their certification does not allow is making ear impressions for children.
Also on staff is Sharra Shores, a Patient Care Coordinator with many years’ experience attending to patient needs as they arise.
Each member of the NRV Hearing team is trained and qualified to provide the best possible patient care and hearing aid services. Because equipment can break, the team is also excellent at providing immediate care as needed for hearing aid services as needs arise. They are well versed with Bluetooth and wireless technology and are able to provide patients with many options with amplification. Giving patients the best care available is the goal of New River Valley Hearing and Joanne herself.
“We’re dead serious about ears here,” says Joanne, grateful for the Psychology degree she earned after high school. “Folks with hearing issues often take it personally.”
Those with hearing loss often feel alone, but it is the third most common untreated health problem worldwide. It is also one of the most common birth defects in the entire world. Hearing loss can come from genetics, too much noise exposure, middle ear disease, metabolic disease processes, vertigo or dizziness disorders, ototoxic exposures, viral diseases, and the normal aging process. That means there is a lot of hearing loss in the world.
As humans, almost everything we do involves talking and listening. That type of communication is what makes us human. Hearing loss impacts communication, and the impacts are significant. Primarily, hearing loss affects our ability to hear and understand. Secondarily, it puts people at greater risk for falls, memory loss, cognitive processing issues, dementia, Alzheimer’s, anxiety, depression, frustration, irritation, and isolation.
Although there is currently no surgical or medical intervention for sensorineural hearing loss, amplification through hearing aids can improve the overall negative impacts hearing loss has on an individual. Hearing aids cannot restore hearing, but they can provide clarity that the ears have lost. Hearing loss treatment through amplification can give confidence back.
Wearing hearing aids can also improve some balance issues. Today’s digital hearing aids are radically different from the hearing aids from just ten or fifteen years ago. They can look good, feel good, and sound good. They are Bluetooth and wireless and allow communication to other devices like TV’s, cell phones, and computers. They can help decrease the interference of background noise and they can be rechargeable, or battery powered. They can also be fine-tuned and adjusted precisely.
Better hearing and better quality of life is the goal at New River Valley Hearing. With a now-established customer base, Joanne and her team pride themselves on developing long-term relationships with their patients. These relationships are based on unsurpassed personal service that begins the first time the patient walks through door.
“When you start out in the working world, you’re not exactly sure what to do,” says Joanne. “So, you try to find your way, and sometimes struggle to find the things that make a difference. And in that struggle, you find something so meaningful that it becomes your life. That’s what Audiology has been for me. It’s the most rewarding thing I’ve ever done in my life. Helping people overcome the impacts of hearing loss, tinnitus, and balance issues became my passion roughly twenty-five years ago, and still is to this day. I want to continue to help people until I’m no longer able to.”
NRV Hearing • Joanne Dillon
www.NRVHearing.com • 540-274-5145
616 West Main St., Suite G, Radford, VA
1482 Floyd Hwy S Floyd, VA