Programs

Ensuring a Healthy Start for Native Children and Young Families

The Center has been conducting cutting edge research in partnership with American Indian tribes since the mid 1990s to design a state-of-the-art in-home parent education program focusing on prenatal and postnatal care through early childhood (0 to 5 years). The project is the first in the U.S. to demonstrate the effectiveness of paraprofessional home visitors, as well as positive maternal and child development as early as infancy.

Over the next 10 years, we plan to:

• Continue to build curricular modules to address emerging needs in young families (i.e., methamphetamine use, childhood injuries, obesity and poor nutrition, mental health, domestic violence, father and elder involvement in childrearing).
• Develop an online training program for Native paraprofessional home visitors.
• Replicate the project with tribes nationwide and indigenous communities around the world.

Promoting Healthy Lifestyles

Nearly two-thirds of American adults are overweight or obese due to sedentary lifestyles and unhealthy eating habits. Obesity rates have increased by more than 60% among adults over the past 10 years. The prevalence of obesity in American Indian/Alaska Native (AI/AN) populations magnifies the national trend and has increased dramatically over the past 30 years. Overall, studies demonstrate that obesity begins early for AI/AN children and becomes a significant contributor to many Native adult health disparities.  Adult consequences include increases in Type 2 diabetes, heart disease, stroke, arthritis, hypertension and breathing problems.

The development of the obesity epidemic in Indian country stems from a complicated history and cultural upheaval.  Solutions must weave together personal responsibility, societal factors such as convenience technology and engineering; food production and marketing patterns; and powerful social and cultural forces that shape communal norms and lifestyles.

The Center is working on initiatives in partnership with Native communities to address and reverse the obesity epidemic through the promotion of traditional food distribution, diets and lifestyle; prevention of drug and alcohol use; and promoting a trajectory of healthy nutrition and physical activity across children's and young adult lifespans.

Pioneering Community-Based Mental Health

American Indians have the highest rates of youth suicide (ages 15-24) of any US population, and among the highest in the world. The White Mountain Apache Tribe, in northern Arizona, suffers from the highest rates recorded in the lower 48 states. Rates of completion among 15-24 year old youth are 13 times higher than the general US population, and each year more than 300 youth and young adults make a suicide attempt that require medical attention.  Existing western clinical and mental health services have not been able to curb the problem since its emergence in 1990. In partnership with the Apache tribe, we are now training Native paraprofessionals to do home-based outreach to suicidal youth and their families. The outreach protocol includes screening, referral and home-based life skills training to help youth and families seek appropriate help and cope with the challenges they face. In parallel to these efforts, our staff is working with elders and youth in the community to create community messages that draw on traditional lessons and understanding to promote the sacredness of life.

The World Health Organization (WHO) predicts that in 2020, depression and mental illness will be the second leading cause of morbidity for youth worldwide. The US Centers for Disease Control (CDC) is seeing significant increases in childhood depression, anxiety and suicidal behavior, after declines for a decade. Reservation communities are also vexed with high rates of alcohol and drug use, precipitated by environmental and historical stressors, which in combination exacerbate mental health issues. Over the next 10 years, the Center's mental health work with the Apaches and similar tribes will contribute important strategies and be a model for developing community-based mental health promotion programs for low-income, stressed communities.