Growing up in the regions and seeing service gaps has made Fiona Baybrooks determined to focus her efforts on rural allied health. Photos: Supplied.
A Charles Sturt University (CSU) student from Cootamundra will be jetting off to Bangkok to present her research at the Asia Pacific Society of Speech, Language and Hearing Conference in December.
Fiona Baybrooks is passionate about adult literacy, and even found herself teaching English in India for four years after completing her bachelor’s degree.
She thoroughly enjoyed her time in India, but reality forced her back Down Under.
“I still go back and visit friends because they’ve become family,” she said.
“But the wage differences started to have an impact.
“I would love to be there full time, but it’s just not possible at the moment.”
Fiona started her own dance group in Cootamundra, inspired by Bollywood.
After spending the past decade as an adult educator at TAFE, she is ready to level up her work in the adult literacy space.
The 39-year-old is now completing her Master of Speech Pathology studies at CSU. Her research is on raising dysphagia awareness, and in Bangkok she will meet other, similarly focused researchers from all over the world.
Dysphagia is a medical condition involving difficulty swallowing. It can be painful, with some people finding it impossible to swallow.
“Those with dysphagia were not aware that they could work with a speech pathologist,” Fiona said.
“Particularly in rural areas, it is harder to link with a multidisciplinary team, but we will work with others in the area to support people with their eating, drinking and swallowing.”
Fiona’s research came about after she realised almost no-one knew anything about dysphagia.
Aside from impacting someone’s quality of life, dysphagia is linked to several other medical conditions, such as stroke, Parkinson’s disease and motor neurone disease, which disproportionately affects the Riverina.
“Imagine if you couldn’t eat and drink safely, how socially isolating that would be,” Fiona said.
“Considering a lot of our social gatherings are really about food and drink, if you have trouble with [eating and drinking], it could be quite distressing.
“And if you think, ‘Oh, I don’t want to bother people with my modified diet’ or ‘I don’t want to make it obvious that I have a modified diet’, a lot of mealtime anxiety would come out of that.
“[They] tend to report that they would step away from instances where social interactions would just be about food.”
Having grown up with pharmacist parents, Fiona noticed a gap in regional communities’ access to allied healthcare, and decided to return to her home town even after spending time in Canberra and India.
“They’re now retired, but growing up in that space has really shaped the direction that I’m moving in today,” she said.
“I think growing up in the regions and seeing the need and a lot of the gaps in allied health makes me even more determined to continue on this trajectory and really focus my efforts on rural allied health.”
But outside of being an adult educator and a master’s student, Fiona has her own dance troupe, Coota Bollywood All Stars, inspired by her fleeting stint in India.
Fiona will be a qualified speech pathologist next year after completing her degree at CSU.
Inspired by her four years in India and love for the culture, she hopes to explore the cross-cultural implications of dysphagia.
But for now, she wants to focus on her research and prepare for the Asia Pacific Society of Speech, Language and Hearing Conference in Bangkok, and possibly do a PhD to expand her research on raising dysphagia awareness.
