October 9, 2018
By: Eric
D. Hargan, Deputy Secretary of the Department of Health and Human
Services
Summary:
After visiting tribal
communities in interior Alaska, Deputy Secretary Hargan praised the quality of
care at Alaska Native health facilities.
A key piece to success in
serving the American people involves going to them in person and hearing what
is important in their lives. That was the reason that a large delegation from
HHS recently made the trip to the interior of Alaska.
Our delegation visited
with Alaska Native community leaders and families in Allakaket, Alatna, Hughes,
Koyukuk, Manley, Tanana, Rampart, and Fairbanks. Through community meetings and
tours of healthcare facilities, we heard about everything from the latest in
Telehealth technology and medicine “vending machines” to Head Start and
eldercare and the continuing challenges of clean drinking water and waste
disposal.
In addition to helping
to enhance HHS’s understanding of the challenges faced by remote tribal
communities, the tour informed our meeting with the Secretary’s Tribal Advisory
Committee (STAC), which convened in Fairbanks on September 24 and 25.
I want to thank Tohono
O’odham Nation Tribal leader Chester Antone, chairman of the STAC, and all STAC
members for joining us in Fairbanks, and thank Tanana Chiefs Conference (TCC)
Victor Joseph, TCC Chief/Chairman, for hosting the HHS delegation from HHS on
our tour of interior Alaska.
During our community
visits, it became abundantly clear that the quality of care offered in Alaska
Native health facilities should be a point of pride for everyone involved in
tribal health. Alaska Native healthcare providers build on the strengths
of tribal culture, customs and community to deliver an impressive
whole-of-person approach to care. Patient needs, community providers, and
community leaders are driving the delivery of quality healthcare.
Providing care in rural
and remote areas is a challenge—one of the most significant problems American
healthcare faces. The challenges are especially substantial in Alaska,
America’s most sparsely populated state, and in other parts of Indian
Country. In Alaska, we got to see a homegrown solution to these
challenges, the Alaska Community Health Aide Program. Community
health aides provide access to primary care, preventive services, urgent care
and emergency response 24/7, 365 days a year in the most rural and remote areas
of Alaska.
We saw this work in
action in Hughes, a community so remote that, as some villages we visited, when
you search for directions online, the result is: “We can’t find directions for
this journey.” In Hughes, our delegation observed a community health aide use
an online diagnostic tool to examine a patient with a rash and then consult
with a physician assistant and a pharmacist in Fairbanks, about 250 miles away,
on treatment approaches through a two-way internet connection. Medicine to
treat the rash was then prescribed in Fairbanks and dispensed through a
“vending machine” in the Hughes clinic.
Thanks to the advanced
systems that Alaska Native communities employ, patient health care information
can be instantly transmitted through a shared electronic medical record,
telehealth connections, and telephone—no travel needed.
Two days later, our
delegation visited the Chief Andrew Isaac Health Center in Fairbanks where we
witnessed, from the other side of the telehealth connection, the follow-up
visit with the patient and community health aide in Hughes.
We shared this model of
care with the STAC members as an approach one community has developed to
providing care in rural and remote locations.
We also took advantage
of our time in Alaska to announce $50 million in new grants to tribes across
the nation, through the new Tribal Opioid Response program, to support
treatment, prevention, and recovery efforts that combat the opioid
crisis.
Thanks to insights
gained in consultation with tribal leaders, these funds were distributed by
formula, which allows these dollars to go to the broadest possible set of
tribes.
While we were in
Fairbanks, we informed leadership from the Fairbanks Native Association and
Tanana Chiefs Conference that they would be receiving new grants from the
Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration at HHS.
These community and
tribal organizations will be receiving three new awards, totaling $6.2 million
over the next few years, to address the opioids epidemic and provide mental
health services to youth and young adults.
The trip to Alaska was a
significant opportunity to hear about the challenges that rural and tribal
communities face in obtaining access to health care, especially when it comes
to mental health and substance abuse. Moreover, it was an excellent chance to
see solutions to these challenges and highlighted the good work in these
communities.
I am grateful to the
tribal and village leaders and the many community members who took the time to
welcome us into your meeting halls and homes to engage in a dialogue so our HHS
team can take back what we learned to Washington.
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