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Bering Witness

In the short time she’s been there, Cheryl Dukas 05N 06MN could write a book about her experiences as a nurse practitioner with a regional tribal health hospital in Northwest Coastal Alaska.

Last fall, Dukas was hired as a village mid-level provider by Norton Sound Hospital and left Georgia in December to begin a three-month orientation in Nome to prepare her for village life and frontier practice. During the first month, she helped deliver her first baby at the hospital.

“It was ‘easy’ with a doctor behind me,” Dukas writes in her online journal. “Not sure how I would feel if I’d been alone out in a village.”

Her orientation prepares mid-level providers for just such medical emergencies. Most of the villages served by Norton Sound are isolated in the Alaskan tundra and can only be reached by air if the weather is good, leaving only well-trained health aides and possibly a mid-level provider as vital links in the health care system.

By April, Dukas was in Gambell, a village of 700 Siberian Yupiks, one of Alaska’s native tribes, on the western tip of St. Lawrence Island and where the Russian mountains are visible across the Bering Sea. During her first 48 hours in Gambell, Dukas was roused late one night to help handle her first trauma—an adult man thrown from an all-terrain vehicle resulting in a severe head injury. By 5:00 am, the patient was stable enough for Medevac transport to Anchorage.

The next day, a woman told Dukas she had heard “nothing but good things” about the care the trauma patient received. “I felt a little choked up, and certainly glad to hear it, but kept my reaction in check,” writes Dukas. “The reality is, I was very humbled by the experience. I didn’t feel particularly proud, but I know we did the best we could, and there is always room for improvement.”

Currently, Dukas is waiting to take on a clinic assignment in Savoonga, another Siberian Yupik community of about 900 people on St. Lawrence Island.