Former chief negotiator heads up health authority
FOCUS ON WELLNESS: Joe Gallagher, the former chief negotiator for
Tla'amin (Sliammon) First Nation, is the chief executive officer of the First
Nations Health Authority, which took over health services for BC first nations
communities from the federal government.
Official transfer from federal government occurred on October 1
by Laura Walz | edi...@prpeak.com
Published: Tuesday, October 8, 2013 5:39 PM PDT
http://www.prpeak.com/articles/2013/10/08/news/doc52549b877027d991977660.txt
A Tla'amin (Sliammon) First Nation community member heads up the first and only
first nations health authority in Canada.
Joe Gallagher is chief executive officer of First Nations Health Authority
(FNHA), which, on October 1, took over health services, programs, employees and
resources from the federal government, which is responsible for health services
on reserves.
Gallagher left Tla'amin in 2005 to take a senior management position with
Health Canada in its first nations programs. He had been Tla'amin's chief
treaty negotiator, a file he worked on for 10 years.
A new relationship between BC first nations, the province and the federal
government was forged in 2005 with the signing of the Transformative Change
Accord. The first plan to come from the accord was the first nations health
plan, followed by a series of agreements that led to the creation of FNHA.
Gallagher has been involved with the agreements from the beginning and was
identified as the person who would supply, from the operational level, the
support to implement the plan.
Now, as chief executive officer of FNHA, Gallagher has the responsibility for
almost 300 staff, an annual budget of $377.8 million and capital resources
including nursing stations and office space throughout the province.
FNHA plans, designs, manages and funds the delivery of first nations health
programs and services in BC. The community-based services are largely focused
on health promotion and disease prevention, such as primary care services,
mental health and addictions programming, health infrastructure, environmental
health and research and non-insured health benefits.
The work will flow not from the top down, but from the ground up, said
Gallagher. "What we're trying to move towards is delivering these services, but
through a first nations decision-making structure, rather than a federal
government decision-making structure," he said. "There's a recognition that
things will work better if first nations decide for themselves how they want to
do things."
The work doesn't replace the role or services of the provincial ministry of
health and regional health authorities. FNHA collaborates, coordinates and
integrates its respective health programs and services to achieve better health
outcomes for BC first nations.
When he left Tla'amin, he decided to work in the health field, because health
is common to all first nations communities, Gallagher said. "Our health status
isn't as good as everyone else's, so it becomes a very interesting common
denominator," he said. "We can work to help people live well and be healthier
and it just makes everything else a little bit better."
The work is focused on health from a wellness perspective, Gallagher explained.
"We want to be champions of health and wellness and partners with each of our
communities and all of our first nations people in the province of British
Columbia on their health and wellness journey."
He is excited by the work, Gallagher also said. "It really is, can we help
people live a little better today by helping them make better choices, perhaps,
on the kinds of food they eat, the kinds of activities they partake in,
understanding how to manage their stress, all those kinds of things," he said.
"Fundamentally it goes to the very individual level as well as working through
the community, nations and family infrastructure we have, just to try to make a
better quality of life for people."
The kinds of services and functions that FNHA takes on from the federal
government have a larger proportion of the work focused on prevention and
promotion, whereas the other health authorities are focused on providing acute
care systems to treat sickness, Gallagher said. "We have the opportunity to
help the province, which knows that it needs to shift from such a major
investment on the sickness side to more preventative, upstream measures so that
it can have hopefully a more sustainable system overall," he said. "We might be
able to help put in place, through a first nations wellness concept, a model of
care that is different from the way the mainstream provides it, which can be
beneficial for all British Columbians."
[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
------------------------------------
Native News North
List info{all lists}:
http://nativenewsonline.org/natnews.htm
Yahoo! Groups Links
<*> To visit your group on the web, go to:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/NatNews-north/
<*> Your email settings:
Individual Email | Traditional
<*> To change settings online go to:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/NatNews-north/join
(Yahoo! ID required)
<*> To change settings via email:
natnews-north-dig...@yahoogroups.com
natnews-north-fullfeatu...@yahoogroups.com
<*> To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to:
natnews-north-unsubscr...@yahoogroups.com
<*> Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to:
http://info.yahoo.com/legal/us/yahoo/utos/terms/
