In 11 years as a telephone medical interpreter, Angela Reyes has learned that you don't have to be present to promote healing.

The patients and health care providers who use her services never see the woman who translates for them, yet they all benefit from her ability to make complex medical terminology and procedures understandable in English and Spanish.

Born in Cuba, Reyes grew up bilingual. She earned an undergraduate degree in biology with a pre-med emphasis from Presbyterian College in Clinton, S.C., but she wanted to travel, so she took a job with Eastern Airlines.

Reyes later taught Spanish and biology to children with learning disabilities and earned a certificate from the graduate translation program at Georgia State University.She was one of 11 out of 85 people to pass an exam to be certified to translate for the Georgia Supreme Court, and she served as a simultaneous translator for the courts and many medical conferences.

Reyes realized that words - their origins and derivations - and the natural sciences were her true interests.

She took a job with Pacific Interpreters, which provides telephone interpreters to help patients who speak limited or no English communicate with medical providers in hospitals, doctors' offices, clinics and emergency rooms nationwide.

"My father had a copy of 'Grey's Anatomy' at home when I was a child, and I loved looking at that book," Reyes said. "I think you have to have a real interest in something to do it well."

Reyes works an eight-hour shift from her home in Atlanta each day, and when the phone rings, she never knows what the
situation will be.

"It might be a pregnant woman in childbirth, a doctor's visit, a mental health evaluation - there was a lot of that after 9/11 - an accident or diabetes education," she said. "Some calls take about 15 minutes, but others, like an ultrasound where the doctor is trying to explain amniocentesis, can take a lot longer."

Her job is to translate exactly what the provider says to the patient in Spanish and what the patient says back, in English (using the first-person tense), without adding or omitting any information or offering opinions.

"You have to really listen and pay attention. You need an in-depth knowledge of the subject matter, good people skills, an excellent command of both languages, a broad vocabulary and good pronunciation," Reyes said.

"Even after all this time, I keep dictionaries nearby, and I'm still learning new slang terms. Many of the countries have different dialects, which change the meaning of words."

Reyes said that the job was exhausting in the beginning and hard on the voice.

"It's very emotional when a child is dying and you're explaining to his parents so that they can make a decision about life support, or when you're telling someone that he has been diagnosed with cancer," she said. "But many times people are so grateful that you are there. They didn't know that interpreters would be available."

For Reyes, one of the job's rewards is knowing that she is helping people.

"This job increases your compassion for so many things," she said. "A lot of people coming from a different culture don't understand our health care system or basic health care terms. It feels good to know that I'm a help," she said.

While working at home can sometimes be lonely, it also has advantages. Reyes can work from anywhere. She delivered translation from Montreal for a year after visiting the city, liking it and moving there. Now she's thinking about living for a year at the beach.

"I've trained my dog not to bark during the day when I'm on the phone, and I don't have to worry about office politics," she said. "I look forward to getting up and going to work in the morning. I'm so glad that after all these years I found that interpretation was the job I was meant to do."