Everyday Health Essentials

The Good Heart Community Center on the Standing Rock Reservation in North Dakota is a one-stop shop for locals. It serves as a social gathering place, a thrift store that helps families in need and a place where people can use the fax machine. Program Partner Rose runs the center, and she helps the community even more by teaming up with Partnership With Native Americans (PWNA) and its Native American Aid (NAA) program. By utilizing NAA’s Healthy Living service, Rose receives deliveries throughout the year full of cleaning and personal care items to distribute. These products act as incentives for the community to sign up for health screenings and receive important education on topics like diabetes.

72-year-old Angie and her 75-year-old husband Dwight receive regular health checkups thanks to Good Heart’s partnership with the tribal health program. Like 27% of Elders in the U.S., Dwight lives with several chronic conditions, including one that impacts half the people on the reservation. Dwight’s health has been deteriorating for 10 years. “I’m always glad that this community center is here,” Angie noted.

Angie and Dwight live on a limited income with most of their resources on health. Angie has had several jobs in the past but now stays close to her husband to care for him. The cleaning and laundry products from NAA are especially useful for Angie. She shared, “It’s like another Christmas to get a bag of supplies. Body wash and lotion – I love that stuff! We’re elderly and we like the bathroom essentials. Dish soap, paper towels and toilet paper are really nice; everything comes in handy because it’s so expensive. Around here – especially Elders – we really appreciate stuff like this.”

To get these items without NAA help, Angie travels an hour to Bismarck. She noted, “My husband and I go to Bismarck once a month, but he’s in a wheelchair so it’s especially hard in the winter.” It’s such a hassle to make the trip that Angie recalls using face masks to dust her home when she ran out of cleaning supplies. With support from Good Heart and NAA, Angie and Dwight can focus more on health and family.

Rose has been a PWNA Program Partner for over a decade and has seen the NAA incentives work for her community. She told us, “Elders get their blood pressure and blood sugar checked, and it’s good to visit with them too. We have to check up on each other more. They can all use the incentives.” Even throughout COVID, when home visits were restricted, Rose assembled bags of NAA products for Elders to pick up, because she knew how much they needed supplies.

On rural reservations, shopping options are limited and often unaffordable for many residents. Donate to NAA to help Elders like Angie and Dwight have access to everyday essentials.