In Remote Communities, an Indigenous Cardiologist’s Program Is Succeeding | The Tyee
An Indigenous-led health care solution called One Heart at a Time is bringing specialized heart-health care to remote Indigenous communities.
The program was created by Dr. Miles Marchand, a preventative cardiologist and cardiac rehabilitation specialist with Vancouver General Hospital, St. Paul’s and Carrier Sekani Family Services, and member of the Okanagan Indian Band (Syilx Okanagan Nation).
The premise is simple: bring cardiac specialists — and the tools they need to do their jobs — to remote communities rather than asking community members to leave their community every time they need to see a specialist.
The execution is challenging, mainly due to how remote the communities of Takla Landing, Yekooche, Saik’uz, Nadleh, Burns Lake and Stellat’en are. These are the communities One Heart at a Time partnered with to run its pilot project last fall.
Each community will generally have a health centre and variable access to health-care providers, sometimes with a regular nurse and visiting family doctors, Marchand said. To access things like a pharmacy, a specialist, or specialized testing, patients will have to leave the community.
The program was created by Dr. Miles Marchand, a preventative cardiologist and cardiac rehabilitation specialist with Vancouver General Hospital, St. Paul’s and Carrier Sekani Family Services, and member of the Okanagan Indian Band (Syilx Okanagan Nation).
The premise is simple: bring cardiac specialists — and the tools they need to do their jobs — to remote communities rather than asking community members to leave their community every time they need to see a specialist.
The execution is challenging, mainly due to how remote the communities of Takla Landing, Yekooche, Saik’uz, Nadleh, Burns Lake and Stellat’en are. These are the communities One Heart at a Time partnered with to run its pilot project last fall.
Each community will generally have a health centre and variable access to health-care providers, sometimes with a regular nurse and visiting family doctors, Marchand said. To access things like a pharmacy, a specialist, or specialized testing, patients will have to leave the community.