This program is provided by ASLIS and is supported by grant funding from the Minnesota Department of Human Services, Deaf, DeafBlind and Hard of Hearing State Services Division.

Presented in: Spoken English with ASL Interpretation

Dr. Heather Brown, DMSc, PA-C, DFAAPA

A native of Washington, DC, Heather Brown received her undergraduate degree in Clinical Psychology from Western Maryland College in 1995, graduating Summa Cum Laude with a Phi Beta Kappa Key. She completed her PA training at George Washington University, earning a Master of Science in Health Sciences and a Certificate of Physician Assistant Studies with honors in 2000, and her doctoral degree at the University of Lynchburg in 2019. Dr. Brown began her clinical career as a Physician Assistant in Emergency Medicine at the University of Maryland Medical System in Baltimore. She joined Mercer University in 2011 as an Assistant Professor in the Department of Physician Assistant Studies and became Director of Clinical Education and Associate Professor at Brenau University in 2020. She joined the ARC-PA in 2023 as a director in higher education accreditation. She also owns a healthcare consulting company through which she presents workshops and trainings nationwide and serves as a Medical-Legal Expert.

In 2013, the American Academy of Physician Associates awarded Dr. Brown its Distinguished Fellow Award. She holds a patent with the US Patent Office and has published in nationally peerreviewed journals, including Health Care Providers and the Americans with Disabilities Act (JAAPA, 2015, co-authored with Anna Webb McDuffie and Eileen Bell Hughes, JD), The Use of Interpreters for Deaf Patients and Patients with Limited English Proficiency (JAAPA, June 2020), and From. Awareness to Action: Clinicians and the Health Care of Deaf Patients in the Journal for Nurse Practitioners.

Anna Webb McDuffie, BS, CI/CT, SC:L, NIC, Core CHI

A native of Atlanta, Anna Webb McDuffie graduated from the University of Tennessee, Knoxville in 1996 with a Bachelor of Science in Interpreting for the Deaf. She subsequently worked as a staff interpreter at the Learning Center for Deaf Children — a bilingual/bicultural school for the Deaf in the Boston area — and as an interpreter for graduate programs at Boston University. She returned to Atlanta in 1999 and has maintained a freelance interpreting practice ever since, bringing over 30 years of interpreting experience across general, medical, and legal settings. Anna holds the Certificate of Interpretation and Certificate of Transliteration (CI/CT) from RID (1999), the Specialist Certificate: Legal (SC:L) from RID (2008) — a credential currently in moratorium with fewer than 300 active holders nationwide — and the National Interpreter Certification (NIC) from RID (2011). She is also a Core Certified Healthcare Interpreter (Core CHI).

She co-published Health Care Providers and the Americans with Disabilities Act in the Journal of the American Association of Physician Assistants (JAAPA, 2015) with Dr. Heather Brown and Eileen Bell Hughes, JD. Anna co-facilitates Essentials of Trial Interpreting at Stetson University College of Law and has been a featured presenter at the Hands Up Conference for three consecutive years. She has served as ASL Department Head on productions for Marvel and HBO. Anna has been teaching the Advanced Medical Interpreting workshop series alongside Dr. Brown since 2008 and is deeply committed to standardizing best practices for medical and legal interpreting. She also teaches workshops on legal interpreting. Anna lives in Marietta, Georgia, with her husband, Eric, her step-daughter, Cece, and her dogs, Pippa and Kiwi.