Pine Ridge, South Dakota: Porcupine Clinic Out of Heat

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Saturday, December 15 2007 @ 08:40 PM PST

Pine Ridge, South Dakota: Porcupine Clinic Out of Heat

Saturday, November 10 2007 @ 12:27 PM PST

Contributed by: nolalove

Views: 182

IndigenousPorcupine Clinic, located in the small community of Porcupine, South Dakota on the Pine Ridge Oglala Lakota [Sioux] Reservation is out of heat. According to Stella White Eyes, Administrative Assistant for the Clinic, the Clinic has closed its doors until it can find resources to fund their heating costs. Porcupine Clinic is the only independent Indian community-controlled health clinic in the United States. It is not connected with the Federal Indian Health Services (IHS) program and is funded primarily by grants and donations. Unfortunately, those resources have become exceptionally rare

this year.

Porcupine Clinic Out of Heat

By Stephanie M. Schwartz, Freelance Writer

Member, Native American Journalists Association

October 26, 2007 Firestone, Colorado

Porcupine Clinic, located in the small community of Porcupine, South

Dakota on the Pine Ridge Oglala Lakota [Sioux] Reservation is out of heat.

According to Stella White Eyes, Administrative Assistant for the Clinic,

the Clinic has closed its doors until it can find resources to fund their

heating costs.

Porcupine Clinic is the only independent Indian community-controlled

health clinic in the United States. It is not connected with the Federal

Indian Health Services (IHS) program and is funded primarily by grants and

donations. Unfortunately, those resources have become exceptionally rare

this year.

Porcupine Clinic opened its doors in 1992 and serves the entire

Reservation as well as the Porcupine District in which it is located.

Patients are billed according to their ability to pay and many patients,

including low-income Elders and children, receive free health care there.

In 2004, the Porcupine Clinic opened its dialysis unit, saving countless

lives of those diabetic patients who could not journey 120 miles away to

Rapid City for needed dialysis treatment several times a week. The only

other dialysis treatment available on the 11,000 square mile (2.7 million

acres) Reservation is located in the small IHS Hospital in the community

of Pine Ridge. But that facility hosts only a handful of dialysis beds,

is up to 100 miles away from the more remote areas of the Reservation, and

is completely unable to treat the vast need of the entire Reservation.

Recent statistics state that the diabetes rate on Pine Ridge is 800% that

of the National average and the life expectancy rate is 52 to 58 years

old. It is said that 55% of the adults on Pine Ridge over the age of 40

have diabetes.

Ms. White Eyes states that the Clinic has been unable to pay their annual

propane tank rental fees of $245 (for both the Clinic and dialysis unit

tanks) or for the propane to fill them. They have three tanks: a

thousand gallon tank which services the main clinic and two five hundred

gallon tanks servicing the dialysis unit. The minimum propane delivery

from their provider, Western Cooperative (WESTCO) out of Chadron and Hay

Springs, Nebraska, is $360.

If all the tanks were filled, at $1.69 per gallon, it would cost well over

$3,000. Further, that will need to happen more than once this winter.

While the dialysis unit helps to fund at least part of its own propane

use, the Clinic is out of funding now, just as winter is approaching fast.

Harvey Iron Boy, Porcupine District Vice President and Head Man, spoke of

the vital role that the Clinic plays in the local district as well as the

Reservation as a whole. Not only are the health care services,

bi-lingual assistance, diabetic education, and dialysis treatments all

meeting critical needs on the Reservation but there are more basic needs

met by the Clinic as well. He pointed out that locals often come into

the Clinic simply to get warm on days when they have no heat in their own

homes.

Ms. White Eyes has contacted various non-profits and assistance

organizations but has largely gone unanswered. Link Center Foundation, a

small all-volunteer non-profit organization out of Longmont, Colorado, was

contacted this week and was also unable to help. With their own heating

assistance program for the elders and disabled on the Reservation

struggling due to lack of donations, there simply was no funding available

to help the Clinic.

However, Audrey Link, Founder/President of the Link Center Foundation

(www.LinkCenterFoundation.org), personally paid the $245 out of her own

pocket for the annual tank rental fees for the Porcupine Clinic and

dialysis unit on Friday. Largely retired and on limited income herself,

Link stated that she couldnt go to sleep tonight if she thought the

dialysis patients and Clinic were going to lose their propane tanks. At

least now, if they can raise any money at all elsewhere, they can use the

money for propane to fill them.

Anyone wishing to donate towards propane fuel for the Porcupine Clinic may

do so directly to the propane company. Please contact:

Loretta at Western Cooperative (WESTCO)

170 Bordeaux St Chadron, NE 69337-2342

Call Toll Free 800-762-9906

Credit Card and Bank Card donations by phone will be accepted. Small

donations are also welcome and will accumulate until the minimum delivery

has been reached and then the company will make a delivery of propane to

the Clinic. Please clearly mark any donation “For Porcupine Clinic.

Donations may also be sent directly to the Clinic. For more information,

please contact:

Porcupine Clinic

Stella White Eyes, Administrative Assistant

P.O. Box 99 Porcupine, SD 57772

Internet Information: http://www.lakotamall.com/porcupine/

Phone: 605-867-5655

Note: Due to lack of heat, there may or may not be anyone available to

answer the phone at the Clinic at this time. Please leave a message.