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By Sam Bennison

To Your Health

First Nation Health Authority improves rural medicine with new ultrasounds

May 7, 2024 | 5:00 AM

PRINCE GEORGE— The First Nation Health Authority (FNHA) is improving rural healthcare with the addition of two new ultrasound machines being added to Kwadacha and Tsay Keh Dene. The new ultrasounds are from request by doctors working in the region who say the new machines will improve patient outcomes.

“The communities are very rural and remote. It’s like a nine hour drive on a Forest Service road or a flight in,” says Julie Morrison, the Vice President of Regional Operations for the Northern Region at the First Nation Health Authority. “People accessing health care would need to travel out if they needed an ultrasound. And this helps a doctor and the nurse practitioner that work in their communities to be able to detect and have a look and see what’s going on first before sending them out.”

Medical teams can use an ultrasound to detect a variety of health problems including pregnancy related issues. This makes it an essential tool for small communities to diagnose a condition before sending the patient to an urban medical centre.

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“It’ll give the doctors the information they need beforehand rather than sending them out,” adds Morrison. “They can can converse with doctors that are in the urban settings and say, this is what we have going on, here’s an ultrasound.”

If this pilot project is successful in improving patient outcomes the First Nation Health Authority will be looking to add more ultrasounds across B.C.’s northernmost communities.

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Email: sam.bennison@pattisonmedia.com