Financial aid sought for health conference

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A national Community Health Representative (CHR) conference scheduled for June 22 to 26 in Calgary will be the first national meeting of approximately 500 Band-employed and Medical Services Branch community health representatives.

The main object of the conference is to produce an event designed to strengthen and reinforce continuing importance of the CHR program and the role of the CHR in improving health care delivery to Indian and Inuit communities.

On April 16, Community Health Representatives from across Alberta met at the Alberta Indian Health care Commission office in Edmonton to discuss fundraising projects to help finance the four-day event, among other topics.

The funding allocated to the national CHR conference by the Medical Services Branch "is not enough."

"All the CHRs are going fundraising in their communities and we are also looking at setting up more projects in the communities to raise the necessary funding to hold the conference, said co-ordinator Sharon Johnstone.

The conference is being co-ordinated by Alberta because it is centralized. Another added touch regarding the conference is that the CHR will be celebrating 25 years of health services.

The CHR role was conceived in the early 60s as a means of Indian and Inuit communities becoming more involved in providing primary health care. The program operated to train and support the employment of individuals from Indian and northern communities to improve health care and instruction within their communities and to improve communications and understanding between community members and health care professionals.

The program was implemented under the mandate of the Medical Services Branch of the Department of National Health and Welfare.

Today, some 565 CHRs are employed in 660 communities serving about 200,000 persons.

It was mentioned at the April 16 meeting that the CHR Association has a charitable number they can use for tax purposes and that it was very necessary to obtain all the support they could from the public to "make this important conference work." The National CHR Co-ordinating Committee has already picked out an agenda that focuses on Community Development and the role of the CHR, Advanced Training Needs, the National CHR Communication Network, information workshops, panel discussions, and workshop sessions with the keynote speaker, Jack Sinclair.

"It will be the first of its kind in Alberta and will give CHRs from across Canada a chance to meet at a national conference. We are depending on the women to go out in their communities and dig for funds and hopefully, the Bands will also contribute towards travel and accommodations. It would help our budget a lot," said Audrey Park, Alberta representative for National CHR Co-ordinator Committee.

Anyone interested in offering donations and or contributions towards the CHRs national conference can call the National Co-ordinating Committee at (403) 426-1216, or write to: 1390 First Edmonton Place, 10665 Jasper Avenue, Edmonton, Alberta.