Martina Lauterbach, Transcript Section 2

Community Health Aide Program Project Jukebox

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KAREN: What kind of things did they train you in, do you remember?

MARTINA: It was more, you know, doing screening types, and then we also did a little bit of dental, but we didn't do -- you know, I guess we just -- you know, they just taught us, you know, what to look for. As far as, you know, dental, what needed to be taken care of right away, I'm sure. So.

And then when we were here, it was a little bit of anatomy during our Phase 2. And more -- you know, a little bit more first aid type things or, you know, what we were taught. So. And history taking, of course, you know, for people, you know, that came in to see the health aide or call the health aide or phone the health aide in the village.

And you know, those days, we were on 7 days a week, 24 hours a day. I mean, you know, we didn't have any leave time or any type of leave, either sick or, you know, annual when I was health aide. That was not, you know, put into our time.

KAREN: And did you have an alternate or it was just more --

MARTINA: Yes, I had, after -- when I first started out, I guess I was working with the two health aides, Russell and Ambrose, and then they were guys, of course, until they went out hunting. And who was left back in the village?

So -- and after one of them left, I had -- I kind of became the primary after the two guys left. And I had several. There would be, like, only two of us in the village. You know, there would be myself and the primary. I mean, primary and the second --

KAREN: Alternates?

MARTINA: Alternate health aide. And, you know, just was kind of like the village would pick, you know, who their -- you know, I guess they would tell us who it was.

So we were both pretty much on call. We weren't -- you know, we couldn't -- if I was gone to maybe escort a patient to Bethel, a baby or, you know, a sick patient, then I would, you know, return quickly. You know, I would go on a charter with the patient and then get them to the hospital, and then return, you know, that same -- same day.

KAREN: Yeah.

MARTINA: So. And -- yeah, that was, you know, the whole time I was a health aide, it was like that.

KAREN: And how did you handle that kind of a schedule?

MARTINA: It was pretty hard. I didn't have any time for anything else. You know, we, of course, we had some slow times, but you know, it was more -- it was more going to the homes at the time, too. We didn't -- you know, they didn't come to the clinic.

KAREN: You had -- you had a clinic?

MARTINA: We had to go to the -- yeah, we had -- I had a little room, BIA schoolhouse in Emmonak. And you know, in that room we had, you know, a refrigerator, we had the -- we used the school's radio that we used to use, you know, for reporting patients and stuff.

And of course, you know, everybody heard. And everybody channeled their radios. Anyways, that's how, you know, we did our patients. Most of the time we went to their homes and did the screening at their home.

And then during the radio, what we called the radio traffic, we had a certain, you know, time that the doctor would, you know, call our -- I can't remember what our number was.

KAREN: You remember the call number?

MARTINA: KIK something. And then, you know, if the weather was nice or sometimes, you know, we had problems with the radio traffic because of the problems, you know, you couldn't hear or they couldn't hear you, we couldn't hear them, you know, type of thing. So...

KAREN: How many people were living in Emmonak at the time, about?

MARTINA: Probably about 500. It was one of the bigger villages, you know.

KAREN: Yeah.

MARTINA: And I was the health aide. So...

KAREN: It seems like, yeah, for one person to be responsible for that many people --

MARTINA: Uh-hum (affirmative).

KAREN: -- that seems like a lot to do.

MARTINA: Uh-hum (affirmative). There was two of us, but you know, we both worked, you know, because -- pretty busy.