Post by Okwes on Jan 11, 2006 15:33:14 GMT -5
Death rate for Indians a concern
www.bismarcktribune.com/articles/2006/01/10/news/state/108294.t
xt
DULUTH, Minn. (AP) - American Indians die at a rate nearly 50 percent
higher than the national average for people their age, according to
the U.S. Indian Health Service.
There are many reasons for the deaths - accidents, suicides, chronic
diseases, poverty and a lack of adequate and culturally sensitive
medical care.
"Having well-trained Indian doctors go back to their communities can
make a real difference," said Indian Health Service spokesman Leo
Nolan.
The University of Minnesota's Center of American Indian and Minority
Health is working to make that difference. The center recruits
American Indian students and helps them through the university's
medical schools in Duluth and Minneapolis.
"I came here for this medical school. It is known for its commitment
to American Indian health, and that's the direction I was going in,"
said first-year medical student Jean Howell. Howell, a member of the
Cherokee Nation, is originally from California and plans to become a
family practice doctor in an American Indian community.
While a doctor doesn't have to be an American Indian to relate to
Indian patients, it is helpful, center Director Dr. Joy Dorscher said.
In July 2003, Ben Muneta - then president of the Association of
American Indian Physicians - told a U.S. Senate committee that
minority patients seeing a white doctor are less confident that they
will receive adequate care than are white patients.
Such mistrust may cause some Indians to avoid doctors.
"As soon as I started, people wanted to see me just because I am
native," said Dr. Arne Vainio, who works at Min-O-Aya-Win Human
Services Center on the Fond du Lac Reservation. "We understand each
other. I grew up without electricity and indoor plumbing a lot of the
time. I understand what poverty is and how it is to have things
stacked against you."
A Mille Lacs Band member, Vainio grew up near Cook. He worked in a
sawmill and a body shop, as a bartender and a construction worker
before becoming a paramedic with the Virginia Fire Department. It was
that job that made him interested in medical school. He received his
doctorate in medicine in 1994 and did his residency with the Seattle
Indian Health Board. He's been at Min-O-Aya-Win since 1997.
Vainio believes there is a need for more Indian doctors.
"They are very, very underrepresented," he said.
American Indians make up 2.8 percent of the U.S. population,
according to the 2000 census. But only 0.3 percent of students in the
nation's medical schools in 2000 were American Indians.
In the early 1970s, the university's medical schools began programs
to encourage American Indians to enter medicine. The school
established the Center of American Indian and Minority Health in 1987
to coordinate and lead its efforts.
The center is one of three Native American Centers of Excellence in
the nation, supported in part by the U.S. Department of Health and
Human Services.
The Minnesota center begins its recruiting efforts in middle school,
with programs designed to keep students interested in education and
attract them to scientific fields.
"Not long ago, minorities were told not to bother because they
couldn't do things like this," said UMD social work instructor and
Leech Lake enrollee John Day. "We're telling them early they can do
this."
UMD's Department of Social Work and the Center of American Indian and
Minority Health work together on some issues, including giving social
workers experience in medical settings.
Dr. Kathleen Annette, the Bemidji area director for the Indian Health
Service, took part in some of the first Indian-directed programs done
by the University of Minnesota medical school in the early 1970s -
first as a high school student, later as an undergraduate and medical
student at UMD.
"The program was really a magnet for both undergraduate and graduate
programs," she said. "Students go through these programs and they
bond. A support system develops so there is support to succeed in
science and in math and in medicine - whatever program you're going
through."
After piquing the interests of students in middle and high school and
in college, the center helps prospective medical students with study
programs and workshops to prepare for admission to medical school. To
help American Indian students through medical school, the center
provides academic counseling, guidance from American Indian doctors
and volunteer opportunities.
"We provide academic support, but the issues are very seldom
academic," Dorscher said. "They are something else. Sometimes it is
the fear of losing who they are."
The center helped Dorscher, a Turtle Mountain enrollee, learn more
about her culture when she was a medical student in the early 1990s.
Her mother had kept Dorscher away from traditional ways.
"The center gave me the opportunity to explore those things," she
said. "I found that extremely helpful. Culture is an asset, not a
deficit."
An advisory board of American Indian elders and professionals helps
guide the center's activities.
Fourth-year medical student Erik Brodt, an Anishinaabe from Cadott,
said the center is like a family.
"I think all of us have had moments where we need lots of support and
then other moments where we are called upon to support other people,"
he said. "The support the center provided me really made medical
school a much more enjoyable experience than the torment many people
associate with medical school."
www.bismarcktribune.com/articles/2006/01/10/news/state/108294.t
xt
DULUTH, Minn. (AP) - American Indians die at a rate nearly 50 percent
higher than the national average for people their age, according to
the U.S. Indian Health Service.
There are many reasons for the deaths - accidents, suicides, chronic
diseases, poverty and a lack of adequate and culturally sensitive
medical care.
"Having well-trained Indian doctors go back to their communities can
make a real difference," said Indian Health Service spokesman Leo
Nolan.
The University of Minnesota's Center of American Indian and Minority
Health is working to make that difference. The center recruits
American Indian students and helps them through the university's
medical schools in Duluth and Minneapolis.
"I came here for this medical school. It is known for its commitment
to American Indian health, and that's the direction I was going in,"
said first-year medical student Jean Howell. Howell, a member of the
Cherokee Nation, is originally from California and plans to become a
family practice doctor in an American Indian community.
While a doctor doesn't have to be an American Indian to relate to
Indian patients, it is helpful, center Director Dr. Joy Dorscher said.
In July 2003, Ben Muneta - then president of the Association of
American Indian Physicians - told a U.S. Senate committee that
minority patients seeing a white doctor are less confident that they
will receive adequate care than are white patients.
Such mistrust may cause some Indians to avoid doctors.
"As soon as I started, people wanted to see me just because I am
native," said Dr. Arne Vainio, who works at Min-O-Aya-Win Human
Services Center on the Fond du Lac Reservation. "We understand each
other. I grew up without electricity and indoor plumbing a lot of the
time. I understand what poverty is and how it is to have things
stacked against you."
A Mille Lacs Band member, Vainio grew up near Cook. He worked in a
sawmill and a body shop, as a bartender and a construction worker
before becoming a paramedic with the Virginia Fire Department. It was
that job that made him interested in medical school. He received his
doctorate in medicine in 1994 and did his residency with the Seattle
Indian Health Board. He's been at Min-O-Aya-Win since 1997.
Vainio believes there is a need for more Indian doctors.
"They are very, very underrepresented," he said.
American Indians make up 2.8 percent of the U.S. population,
according to the 2000 census. But only 0.3 percent of students in the
nation's medical schools in 2000 were American Indians.
In the early 1970s, the university's medical schools began programs
to encourage American Indians to enter medicine. The school
established the Center of American Indian and Minority Health in 1987
to coordinate and lead its efforts.
The center is one of three Native American Centers of Excellence in
the nation, supported in part by the U.S. Department of Health and
Human Services.
The Minnesota center begins its recruiting efforts in middle school,
with programs designed to keep students interested in education and
attract them to scientific fields.
"Not long ago, minorities were told not to bother because they
couldn't do things like this," said UMD social work instructor and
Leech Lake enrollee John Day. "We're telling them early they can do
this."
UMD's Department of Social Work and the Center of American Indian and
Minority Health work together on some issues, including giving social
workers experience in medical settings.
Dr. Kathleen Annette, the Bemidji area director for the Indian Health
Service, took part in some of the first Indian-directed programs done
by the University of Minnesota medical school in the early 1970s -
first as a high school student, later as an undergraduate and medical
student at UMD.
"The program was really a magnet for both undergraduate and graduate
programs," she said. "Students go through these programs and they
bond. A support system develops so there is support to succeed in
science and in math and in medicine - whatever program you're going
through."
After piquing the interests of students in middle and high school and
in college, the center helps prospective medical students with study
programs and workshops to prepare for admission to medical school. To
help American Indian students through medical school, the center
provides academic counseling, guidance from American Indian doctors
and volunteer opportunities.
"We provide academic support, but the issues are very seldom
academic," Dorscher said. "They are something else. Sometimes it is
the fear of losing who they are."
The center helped Dorscher, a Turtle Mountain enrollee, learn more
about her culture when she was a medical student in the early 1990s.
Her mother had kept Dorscher away from traditional ways.
"The center gave me the opportunity to explore those things," she
said. "I found that extremely helpful. Culture is an asset, not a
deficit."
An advisory board of American Indian elders and professionals helps
guide the center's activities.
Fourth-year medical student Erik Brodt, an Anishinaabe from Cadott,
said the center is like a family.
"I think all of us have had moments where we need lots of support and
then other moments where we are called upon to support other people,"
he said. "The support the center provided me really made medical
school a much more enjoyable experience than the torment many people
associate with medical school."