A NTHC to me means a place where real patient care can be delivered in a pure sense.
We get to really focus on things that are going to make patient care as good as it can
be.
And it's not in any one area, it's not in environmental health or engineering, it's
not just at the hospital, health is really a holistic evaluation.
How can we get better without knowing what our challenges are and talking about them
and sharing our story?
Sixty percent of our patients come in from rural Alaska to be seen at A&M C and accommodations
was a huge barrier and our governance and executive leadership said that's not acceptable
and so working on patient housing was one of the big focuses I was assigned to that project
and that started the strategic access development.
It is six stories, two hundred and two patient rooms.
The sixth floor is actually dedicated specifically to our maternal and family patients.
Folks can get a cup of coffee, get ready to go to their appointments, walk over in the
skybridge, they'll be able to go right into A&M C and get the highest quality care possible.
My name is Leticia Payne and I was diagnosed with breast cancer in July of 2015.
So when I'd go in for my chemo treatments, we'd go in through the double doors and the
doors would lock and you have to sit there for four to eight hours.
And you looked around the room and everybody else was in an infusion chair in the Coral
Hospital without a window.
Literally you were a foot away from the next patient.
You can hear everything.
We didn't have enough space, we were at the max of our capacity.
Where else on campus could we make sure that we provide that service to our patients?
Our renovation of the Healthy Communities building really started with a need to make
the environment more nurturing, making the environment more nurturing leads to a much
better healing process.
That created a whole new way for us to be able to provide infusion and oncology.
Other patients are already going through so much and making these improvements is not
a waste because you can look out to nature and feel like, oh I'm here, I'm alive, this
is a new day, let me heal.
Health is not just physical health, it includes environmental health, community health, health
in terms of quality education, reduced energy costs to critical services in a community.
So really health care is everything that makes a community work.
Telehealth has amazingly enhanced the care that we're able to provide.
I have one family whose mother is the only post office worker in the town so when they
had to come to a visit the post office was closed for three days and to be able to only
have the post office closed for an hour made a huge difference for that whole village.
It's more than just coming to Anchorage to get care, ANTHC provides care for the entire
state.
Over the last five years we've seen a 44% increase in specialty clinic visits at Alaska
Native Medical Center.
There's been massive expansion of the infrastructure, the facility, different buildings, new clinics,
more providers.
Our team travels to communities about 10 times a year.
We have over 550 community health aides and over 170 villages in rural Alaska.
We're the first time in seven or eight years but IATRI will be offering specialty clinics
to the regions.
In the last year our rural energy initiative has constructed five heat recovery projects.
These communities, they're saving about 120,000 gallons of heating fuel annually.
So we manage, operate and maintain water and sewer systems in 27 communities throughout
the state.
We need to be working in communities to create more systemic change.
I think it's for ANTHC's responsibility and I think we do a very good job making sure
that we're paying very close attention to the whole Alaska Tribal Health System and
to stay very connected and I think it's our responsibility to be that hub of connection.
I've never worked for a more passionate organization that really works to see our vision through.
We are here for you.
We could not exist without you.
All the work that we do is to improve health and we want your feedback.
We want to know how we can make things better.
We want your input.
We want your participation.
We want to hear your voice.
We want to stay around forever and we want to know that we're having an impact.
