Impacts of historical trauma on chronic illness management

Introduction:

This project is a community-based participatory research project that has been in partnership since 1996 and is led by a community advisory board (CAB). The partnership is between a university and a northern plains tribal nation. The partnership decided to work in the area of chronic illness management in order to develop a tribally-specific intervention. The partners conducted this research by conducting interviews to learn about this area. Historical trauma has been considered a factor that impacts chronic illness management, both in terms of a contributing factor and as a resilience factor.

Methods:

Interviews were conducted with 30 men and women from a northern plains tribal nation who had chronic illness. The men and women had a variety of conditions. The interview questions were open-ended. The data was co-analyzed with the CAB using indigenous methods. We received IRB approval from the local tribal community college for this work

Results/Conclusions:

We will describe the interview process, and demographic information on the participants. We will share information specific to the following questions. In what ways do you think historical losses such as land loss, broken treaties, boarding schools, and language loss have had an effect on the health of our people? In what ways do you think these historical losses have affected people getting and coping with chronic illness? We will also describe the next steps for this project.