First Nation Health Authority improves rural medicine with new ultrasounds

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.