COMMUNITY HEALTH AIDE PROGRAM

The CATG Community Health Aide Program (CHAP) works with the Village Councils of Arctic Village , Beaver, Birch Creek, Circle, Fort Yukon , and Venetie to provide high quality health care to the residents of those communities.

Community Health Aides work within the guidelines of the Alaska Community Health Aide/Practitioner Manual. An established referral network that includes mid-level providers at the Yukon Flats Health Center in Fort Yukon , physicians at Fairbanks 's Chief Andrew Isaac Health Center , and the Alaska Native Medical Center in Anchorage allows the health aide to work closely with other medical experts. Clinics in the CATG region all are connected to the Alaska Telemedicine Network.

The CATG Community Health Aide Program has positions for two health aides in each village. Health aides are supervised by a Community Health Practitioner and a Physician Assistant out of Fort Yukon. Community Health Aides are selected by their villages to receive intensive training in Nome, Sitka, or Anchorage. Training then continues with supervised practice in the village, and in the subregional center in Fort Yukon , before the health aide continues at the training center. It typically takes a newly hired health aide 4 years to complete the entire training cycle.