We salute those who - New Orleans City Business

VOLUNTEERBetty DugasPosition: auxiliary member, West Jefferson Medical CenterAge: 79Family: sons, Mirtile, 59, Jay, 45Education: L.H. Marrero High SchoolAt the age of 79, Betty Dugas is one of West JeffersonMedical Center’s most dedicated auxiliary volunteers,clocking in three days a week to assist the medical staff.“It’s very rewarding,” said Dugas, who started volunteeringat the hospital 22 years ago. “It gives me something to doinstead of staying home.”After retiring from a 28-year career with the JeffersonParish Clerk of Court and experiencing the death of her husbandand a son, Dugas decided she “had to find somethingto do.”A friend encouraged her to volunteer at West JeffersonMedical Center, a place Dugas remembered since highschool as a sanctuary for her ill relatives. Through the pasttwo decades, Dugas has volunteered more than 24,000hours.Many of those hours involved work with the WJMCAuxiliary’s Junior Volunteer Program, a hospital servicegroup comprised of teenagers who share an interest in healthcare careers.Dugas made certain that each young volunteer received anobligatory orientation before their summer work, and sheworked hard to match each teen’s assignment preferencewith the appropriate hospital department. At the end of theprogram, Dugas also volunteered to oversee the planning andexecution of the Junior Volunteer Recognition Program.Along with many of the hospital’s employees and a groupof her Auxiliary peers, Dugas found herself on duty duringHurricane Katrina and the storm’s aftermath. For more thana week, she remained at the hospital, beginning her day at 6a.m. without knowing the day’s assignments.While she is called upon to help with many different tasks,Dugas said one of her duties is to inform others about thehospital’s services.“I love to give information,” she said.•— Amy Ferrara Smithphoto by Frank AymamiVOLUNTEERJoseph HeintzPosition: Spanish teacher, East Jefferson General HospitalAge: 85Family: singleEducation: bachelor’s degree in French and English, TulaneUniversity; doctor of the University, philosophy, University of ParisWhen retiree Fritz Heintz showed up at East JeffersonGeneral Hospital a couple of years ago to volunteer,he expected to be put to work in the gift shop. A friend whosent him there told him they needed a man to help lift bigpackages, Heintz said.But once the volunteer services supervisor checkedHeintz’s resume and saw he had extensive experience as alanguage teacher, he was assigned instead to teach Spanishto staff members needing to communicate with the area’sgrowing post-Katrina Hispanic population.Heintz’s students include therapists, nurses and othervolunteers who work at the hospital’s Wellness Center. Heteaches basic Spanish, intermediate medical Spanish andintermediate nonmedical Spanish, conducting four classestwice a week.Heintz has taught Spanish and French at every levelfrom elementary school to college. Immediately before hisretirement in 1985, he did a 10-year stint at St. BenildeCatholic School in Metairie, where he discovered heenjoyed working with students at the grammar school level.“That’s the place where you can really teach those kidsphoto by Frank Aymamiand influence them,” he said.A former Navy officer, Heintz indulged his wanderlustfor many years after retiring from the military. His travelstook him to France, where he studied philosophy at theUniversity of Paris; Osaka, Japan, where he taught philosophyto military personnel and gave English lessons to theJapanese; and Mexico and Spain, where he took universitycourses in Spanish.At EJGH, Heintz has learned to be flexible when his students’workload sometimes prevents them from keeping upwith their Spanish lessons as much as they would like.“My students are wonderful to me. I hope I am makinga difference in their lives and in the hospital.”•— Sonya StinsonNew Orleans CityBusiness — May 25, 2009 37