There’s a new hub for Native American health in the Black Hills: The Great Plains Native American Health Hub, supported by Johns Hopkins University, has opened in Rapid City.
Officials say the site will be part of the Johns Hopkins Center for Native American Health and will offer new health care options specifically for Native Americans.
Oglala Lakota physician Donald Warne is co-director of the Native American Health Center.
“Unfortunately, here in the Dakotas we have some of the worst health disparities in the nation. The average age of death for Native Americans is in the late 40s, but for the rest of the population it’s in the late 70s,” Warne said. “So we have a 30-year difference in the average age of death. A lot of that is preventable. When we think about preventable issues, we’re in the public health and medical field.”
He said creating a safe and trustworthy environment for Indigenous healthcare is the first step.
“The leadership team at Great Plains Hub is entirely Lakota,” Warne says, “and I think messengers are really important in research, healthcare and community engagement. One thing we’re excited about is we have a new research project studying the Lakota population, and it’s led entirely by a Lakota research team. We can’t think about research in this silo. We have to see this as an opportunity to provide more training to members of our community who may be interested in a career in healthcare.”
Mr Warne’s colleague, research fellow Dr Courtney Clausen, said the hub would bring together doctors from across the region and focus on specific local challenges.
“It’s great to have a location here in Rapid City,” Clausen says, “We have a lot of great team members from all over the country. We have connections not only nationally but also with the South Dakota community, so we’ve been able to meet a lot of really great people who work in the healthcare field in the Great Plains region.”
Another big attraction of the center is that it will address brain drain by bringing doctoral degree recipients back to western South Dakota.
