Indian Country Today Health

PRINCETON, N.J. – The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation selected Frances Stout, a retired registered nurse and chairperson of the Tohono O’odham Nursing Care Authority in Sells, Ariz., to receive a Community Health Leaders Award.

Dr. Mona Gohara, a skin cancer expert at Yale New Haven Hospital, says people of color need to know three important facts:

The power to change our lives and our communities begins with changing our destinies. For most, this means changing our lives through education. Our elders recognized this need more than 100 years ago.

There are many myths about diabetes, but it is not a myth that you have the power to prevent Type 2 diabetes; prevention is proven and possible.

Dementia and Alzheimer’s disease are so closely related to the obesity and diabetes that already runs rampant among Native Americans that the whole process of indigenous cognitive decline is starting to be referred to as Diabetes III, a new category.

WASHINGTON – House Speaker Nancy Pelosi has vowed to protect the rights of Native Americans in her quest to reform health care.

IGNACIO, Colo. – A lengthy battle by the Southern Ute Indian Tribe ended with a win Oct. 1 as the tribe prepared to take over operation of the Southern Ute Health Center, a former IHS facility that provides health care to Southern Ute tribal members and other local American Indians.

The National Breast Cancer Awareness Month program is dedicated to increasing awareness about the importance of the early detection of breast cancer through a nationwide campaign each October. NBCAM started as a weeklong campaign in 1985 with two founding members.

The introduction of the 2009 H1N1 (swine) flu vaccination has set the blogosphere abuzz, with wary Americans questioning the vaccine’s safety and effectiveness, even whether illness from the H1N1 flu virus poses a serious threat.

Are we in the final days of the health care reform debate?

The vaccine for the 2009 H1N1 influenza A (swine flu) virus arrived at IHS clinics and facilities Oct. 7. The seasonal flu vaccine was already at the clinics.

October is National Breast Cancer Awareness Month, and for the first time in history, the American Cancer Society is lighting up the State Capitol pink in South Dakota to promote breast cancer awareness and the importance of screening. Witness this historic event, come celebrate survivors and learn about new ways to fight back against breast cancer.

WASHINGTON – A football star was recently featured at the Department of the Interior with a plan to help children attending Native American schools get healthy.

WALLACEBURG, Ontario – Last year at the 2008 Potawatomi Gathering of Nations, Walpole Island leadership was approached about developing a cost-effective pharmacy business to supply U.S. Potawatomi tribes’ pharmaceutical needs.

VERONA, N.Y. – The Oneida Indian Nation has been notified by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services that its Oneida Nation Health Center has demonstrated “exemplary performance” in providing quality care to its patients and undertaking proper documentation to “benefit patients and improve overall quality of care to patients.”

TULSA, Okla. – More than 200 community members helped celebrate the Indian Health Care Resource Center of Tulsa, Inc.’s official groundbreaking ceremony for its 26,000-square-foot expansion July 14.

HOULTON, Maine – The Houlton Band of Maliseet Indians’ community will be busy over the next year.

We have the power to change our lives for the better. Regardless of whether we have a medical problem such as diabetes, we have the capacity to live a healthy life and to make changes that may be long overdue.

MADISON, Wis. – In olden days, Clarissa Welds, an elder of Lake Superior, as she calls herself, never worried about how many fish she ate.

WASHINGTON – A new study found the birth rate among American Indian and Alaska Native teen girls increased more than twice the national amount between 2005 and 2007.