Cortez Masto’s bill would improve Indian Health Service recruitment, Senate panel told 

Representatives from the Reno-Sparks Indian Colony Tribal Health Center and the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services this week urged a Senate panel to approve legislation to help recruit and retain health care workers at Indian Health Service (IHS) facilities.

The IHS Workforce Parity Act, co-sponsored by Nevada Democratic Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto and Oklahoma Republican Sen. Markwayne Millen, would allow providers working part-time to access IHS scholarship and loan repayment programs.  

This bill would bring IHS’s program in line with the requirements for the National Health Service Corps (NHSC) loan and scholarship programs, which allow U.S. students pursuing health care careers to have their education costs covered as long as they commit to providing health care in provider-shortage areas thus helping recruitment efforts in these areas. 

“This legislative change would create parity between IHS and the NHSC programs and enable IHS to make better use of these tools to recruit and retain key professionals in a highly competitive environment,” HHS Assistant Secretary Egorin said at the hearing. 

IHS has a 25% vacancy rate for health care providers nationally, but the vacancy rates in rural and frontier tribal clinics in Nevada can be as high as 50%, Reno-Sparks Indian Colony Tribal Health Center Executive Director Angie Wilson told the Senate Indian Affairs Committee during a hearing this week. 

Many IHS sites don’t have a full-time provider and the current requirement that health care professionals work full-time to access grant and loan repayment benefits acts as a barrier, Wilson said.

Understaffing at IHS facilities worsens health care outcomes for tribal communities in areas such as diabetes, cirrhosis, chronic lung diseases, and behavioral health needs, Wilson said.

By failing to address understaffing, the U.S. is also failing to fulfill its trust responsibility to ensure the health care needs of Native communities.

Trust Responsibility is a legal agreement between First Nations and the federal government that the U.S. government will protect tribal treaty rights, lands, and resources including supporting self-governance through “legislative authorization and adequate funding.”

“The health outcomes for our Indian people should be the report card for how well the Trust Responsibility is being upheld,” she said in testimony.