Fred H. Bess

Fred Bess, Ph.D. Fred H. Bess, Ph.D. is Associate Director of the Vanderbilt Bill Wilkerson Center of Otolaryngology and Communication Sciences and served as Director of the former Bill Wilkerson Center from 1978 until its merger with Vanderbilt University Medical Center in 1997. He is also Professor of Audiology and Chair of the Department of Hearing and Speech Sciences at Vanderbilt. The Department grants Master's and Doctoral degrees in Speech/Language Pathology and Audiology. Dr. Bess completed his undergraduate education at Carthage College in Kenosha, Wisconsin, his Master's at Vanderbilt University, and his Ph.D. in Audiology at the University of Michigan. In 1969, he initiated and directed the Audiology Program at Central Michigan University, where he remained until joining the Vanderbilt faculty in 1976. He is the author of well over a hundred and fifty journal articles, book chapters, monographs and books dealing with hearing and hearing impairment. Also numbering over one hundred are professional papers presented at scholarly meetings throughout the country. He has been principal investigator or project director for several million dollars in privately and federally funded research, training and demonstration grants. In addition, Dr. Bess has served as chairperson for seven symposia, which attracted international participation. Judith Gravel, Ph.D. Judith Gravel, Ph.D. was Director of the Center for Childhood Communication at the Children's Hospital of Philadelphia, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania and was the William P. Potsic Endowed Chair in Pediatric Otolaryngology and Childhood Communication. Her clinical activities, research interests and publications were in the areas of pediatric audiologic assessment, early identification of hearing loss, the developmental sequelae associated with early otitis media with effusion and mild hearing loss. She was a member of the NIH-NIDCD Working Group on Early Identification of Hearing Impairment and was a co-investigator in the New York State Newborn Hearing Screening Demonstration Project. Dr. Gravel was Chair of the New York State consensus panel that developed the evidence-based Clinical Practice Guideline: Hearing Loss in Children, 0 - 3 Years. She served as audiology liaison on the technical panel that developed the Clinical Practice Guideline on Otitis Media with Effusion. Dr. Gravel served on committees related to childhood hearing loss for the National Center on Birth Defects and Developmental Disabilities Early Hearing Detection and Intervention Program of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the Maternal and Child Health Bureau, and the National Center for Hearing Assessment and Management. She served on the Joint Committee on Infant Hearing (JCIH) and was Chair of JCIH from 2003 to 2005.