IHS: Indian Health Services

Tonight we got a tour of the Hospital. It is a wonderfully modern building...which is underwhelmingly understaffed. They have a great ICU area...but no ICU doctors work on staff currently. The bizarre thing about the Hospital is that they deal with very "modern" problems like meth-babies and STDs, but they also face very "old" problems, like TB and Whooping cough (and not just in small quantities). The infant mortality rate here is the worst in the country. It was interesting to see how Lakota culture impacted the provision of healthcare; they had phone numbers for pastors and medicine man; the mission statement involved the key Indian symbol (a cross and circle); medicine men can ask for scapels for sun dances. However, the overwhelming impact of being on a rez was the reality of the situation: diabetes, younger pregnancies (although teen pregnancies are going down), a rural population in need of distributed health services. The nurse here indicated that often people who come for help there will grow uncontrollably angry at the staff due to the slowness in getting help; the anger expressed is not simply a reflection of the particular situation, but manifestation of years of anger at white America. However, the nurse loved her job. I think the people that chose to work here see obvious meaning in their professions.