2025 Gila River Healthcare Nursing Conference Bridging the Path to Wellness

Bridging the Paths to Wellness

Significant health disparity exists in our Native American communities, with morbidity and mortality far exceeding the norms for other populations within the United States. The reasons for this disparity lie in a complex social and historical web that began with colonization and extends to the failure of Western (Allopathic) medicine to effectively bridge the gaps between traditional paths to wellness and modern medical intervention, leaving Native Americans frustrated, confused and often resistant to care.

Because nursing has a significant presence in Native communities, we are uniquely positioned to help create those much-needed bridges. However, in order to do so, we require an in-depth look at the cultural definition of health, traditional healing, and those historic traumas that have created many of the divides that separate traditional and allopathic paths to wellness. Heath equity begins with cultural humility and education; learning a way of life and thinking that is unfamiliar in non-native peoples, then assimilating what we have learned into our day to day strategies for meeting their healthcare needs.

This conference seeks to provide our healthcare staff with a view of wellness and healing from the perspective of our community, provide them with understanding of the overwhelming effects of historic trauma on native health, explore current tribal efforts to restore health sovereignty to their people, and challenge them to apply what they have learned in their day to day practice.

Overall Learning Objectives:

1. Identify those historic events that have significantly contributed to Native American Health Disparity.

2. Compare and Contrast the concepts of health from both a cultural/traditional viewpoint and current allopathic models of care.

3. Identify opportunities to reduce health disparity by incorporating traditional wellness and healing practices into Allopathic care processes.

To receive CE credit for this live activity, you must:

· Sign in at the registration desk to verify attendance

· Be present no later than 5 minutes from the start of each approved CE presentation and attend the entire presentation

· Successfully complete the online Exploring Nursing Education and Patient Care Conference Evaluations. To receive CE, your completed evaluation and CE request form must be submitted at the close of the conference.

· CE certificates will be issued to participants via email by October 31, 2025

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