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Dawn McCusker, MS MPH, Office of Epidemiology, NM DOH, New Mexico Department of Health, 1190 St. Francis Dr, PO Box 26110, Santa Fe, NM 87502, 505-476-3073, dawn.mccusker@doh.state.nm.us
New Mexico is a culturally diverse state, home to 19 Pueblo Tribes, 2 Apache Tribes, and part of the Navajo Nation, with about 10% of the population identifying as American Indian. Through the New Mexico Assessment Initiative, the New Mexico DOH has hired a Tribal Epidemiologist and is partnering with other agencies to build local tribal capacity around health assessment. The New Mexico Assessment initiative is taking a three-pronged approach to building tribal capacity to conduct health assessment: 1) assess capacity to conduct and use health assessment in tribal program and policy planning/ development/ evaluation; 2) provide assessment related technical assistance to tribal communities; and 3) provide necessary and desired training to build local assessment skill capacity. The uniqueness of each tribe requires flexibility and individualized assistance. Partnerships between NMDOH, tribes, IHS, universities and inter-tribal agencies have been vital in the efforts of the Assessment Initiative. Much of the collaboration process has resulted from the Native American Data Advisory Workgroup, a forum for tribal communities and partnering organizations to discuss issues regarding health assessment. NMDOH has been the leader in collecting tribal identifiers on vital records and through the Assessment Initiative is compiling health data from other source for American Indians in New Mexico. In the effort to provide useful information to Tribes for health assessment, one major barrier has been access to population estimates for Tribes. The New Mexico Assessment Initiative is striving to put systems in place to maintain an infrastructure that will support communities through health assessment.
Learning Objectives: At the conclusion of this session, the participants will be able to
Keywords: Health Assessment, American Indians
Presenting author's disclosure statement:
I do not have any significant financial interest/arrangement or affiliation with any organization/institution whose products or services are being discussed in this session.