Health Aide Training Program

High rates of poverty and limited accessibility to 70% of the state's villages describe rural Alaska. Moreover, cultural misunderstandings can make it difficult for Western-trained providers to properly treat Native patients. The Alaska Native Tribal Health Consortium (ANTHC) recognized that the well-being and sustainability of their communities were compromised due to a lack of access to health care and has worked to develop education programs that address the unique needs of their people.

Tribal villages or regional tribal health organizations select local residents as health aides. Trainees attend sessions consisting of several weeks of standardized instruction. In 2004, ANTHC introduced a program designed to address the lack of oral care in the villages. In 2009, alongside other tribal health organizations, the Consortium launched a certified Behavioral Health Aide educational program to provide counseling services in rural communities.

Seventy-five remote villages now utilize dental health aides, giving more than 40,000 Alaska Native people access to regular dental care. In its first decade, the Behavioral Health Aide program graduated more than 100 individuals who currently serve as counselors and health educators within the Alaska health care system.

The specific role of a health aide in each village varies according to patient needs, the aide’s skills, other resources available in the community, and local customs. Health aides communicate in ways that patients understand and use culturally appropriate approaches, often integrating care plans with traditional healing methods. As an example, some Behavioral Health Aides have prescribed berry picking and beach combing as mindfulness therapy.

This new facility allowed the three health aide training programs to co-locate, educate students in the same building, use shared resources, and build towards common points of collaboration. All three health aide training programs joined together in 2021 to co-host the first Integrated Care Forum that provided training and education on important topics related to all three disciplines.