Elder Health Program
NAL Boston’s Elder Health Program was founded in October 2015, by Janelle Pocowatchit and Nena Howlingcrane to provide elders a safe place to gather and speak with other elders on Native American issues including living in an Urban Area. Elder Health Program serves the American Indian and Alaska Native community ages 55 and up. NAL staff and community partners provide health promotion/disease prevention activities, monthly workshops, YMCA membership, and health and educational field trips that benefit the elder population. Elder Health is held Thursdays from 11:00 am to 1:00 pm at our Boston office. Please contact our Boston office for more information.
Youth and Families Program
In the Native community our youth are a sacred representation of our future and as such our Youth and Families Program focuses on making our youth as resilient and as fulfilled as possible. We specifically target issues of suicide and substance use due to knowledge our youth are at increased risk. We do this by providing health education, cultural education, positive elements, support to guardians, counseling to youth and opportunities for youth to engage in positive growth. Contact our Baltimore or Boston offices for more information or visit our calendar of events for a list of upcoming Youth and Families events.
Family Spirit Program (Parenting Support)
NAL case managers are trained by John’s Hopkins Center for American Indian Health to provide parenting support using the Family Spirit model. Family Spirit’s culturally tailored intervention is delivered by community-based paraprofessionals as the core strategy to support young parents from pregnancy to 3 years post-partum. It is a behaviorally focused intervention, responsive to parents’ and children’s needs. Leveraging indigenous understandings of health, Family Spirit addresses intergenerational behavioral health problems and applies local cultural assets overcoming deficits in the professional healthcare workforce in low-resource communities. It is the only evidence-based home-visiting program ever designed for, by, and with American Indian families, with key significance in communities experiencing stressed resources and behavioral health disparities. For more information on the Johns Hopkins Center for American Indian Health Family Spirit model visit: https://caih.jhu.edu/programs/family-spirit. Please contact our Boston or Baltimore offices for more information.