Wanted: Good Native doctors

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Joseph Yellowhorn hopes that a $1.5 million health facility being built on the Peigan reserve, 90 km east of Lethbridge, will be more than a place for his people to receive excellent medical attention.

He would like medical attention to come from Native physicians and dentists.

"Our goal is to get Native professionals," said Yellowhorn, the Health Needs Assessment Co-ordinator in charge of construction. "We want to be able to provide employment opportunities for those Peigan people who have got an education. They know the community, the culture, the values, the traditions, the language."

Employment for Native people won't begin with the medical crews. It has already begun with the construction crews.

As part of the contract, sub-contractors hired locally, with skilled, semi-skilled and laborers getting work on the project.

"It's all short term," Yellowhorn said, "but there's been quite a few hired."

The 800 sq.m, four-wing facility, funded through Health Canada, will be ready to house both visiting and permanent professionals by mid-December.

Another benefit Yellowhorn sees to the facility is the ability to serve Peigan Nation people at home and in their own language.

"A lot of people feel very uncomfortable when they have to go into a hospital," he noted, "and some people can't totally express themselves in English. The building is an asset. More space, more privacy, better access for our people."

A health needs assessment study was started in May 1996 to determine what services were needed. That survey has resulted in a facility that will provide space for physicians, a dentist, a physiotherapist, a pharmaceutical dispensary, mental health and client counsellors, family violence and Brighter Future's co-ordinators, community health representatives, community health nurses, and two rooms for baby clinics.

"We've built with room for expansion," said assistant director, Charlotte Provost.

That expansion could include acute care beds, giving residents released early from hospital a place to recuperate before heading home.

The need to build the new facility came about as the old medical services trailer became too small, Provost said.