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Cure the women and you cure the tribe (continued)
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| Providers say the Indian Health Service facility in Crow Agency has benefited from the Messengers' work. Photo by Kelly Gorham. |
The other half of success
Suzanne Christopher does not speak Crow, but she listens to it well.
In fact, listening is one of Christopher's most acutely developed scientific skills. That is important, because Christopher is a specialist in a field of science called community-based participatory research. Instead of scientists coming to a community and conducting research developed somewhere else, community-based participatory research involves community members in all aspects of a project. It is a brand of science that is similar to Christopher in temperament: quiet but dynamic, leaving glitzy headlines for others.
American Cancer Society's Elk says that observing the Messengers and assessing the success of their work has proven to her that their techniques are the best way to work in communities.
"When the community has a stake in the project, when everyone in the community has a role to play, the project works," Elk says.
While the Messengers' approach was refined on the Crow, it was born far away, in Christopher's hometown of Menomonee Falls, Wis. Christopher's family attended a Catholic parish founded on principles of social justice and led by an activist priest, Father Fran Eschweiler.
"I was born learning that this is how you work with people," Christopher recalls. "It's not hierarchical."
Christopher has degrees in health promotion and wellness from the University of Wisconsin-Stevens Point and a master's from Purdue University. Her doctorate in health behavior and health education is from the School of Public Health at the University of North Carolina in Chapel Hill, a leading institution in the field of community-based participatory research.
"So (community-based participatory research) is in my blood. I believe it is the only way to work," Christopher said. "You don't go to communities and tell people what to do. You ask them what they need and how we can work together."
She first visited the Apsaalookee soon after she came to MSU in 1995. The State of Montana announced small grants to communities to develop effective ways of outreach. Six of the seven grants were for larger cities, but one was for the Crow Reservation.
At about that time, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services/Indian Health Service statistics indicated that cervical cancer mortality rates in the Billings area were the highest among IHS programs nationally.
McCormick arranged a gathering of Crow women, which Christopher attended, at Hardin's Purple Cow restaurant. Christopher took furious notes on a restaurant napkin as the women talked about tribal health needs and attitudes.
"Those women sort of set what Messengers would be," Christopher said of the 1996 meeting.
"I always tell the story of how Suzanne went to Alma's house in Hardin and literally watched and listened for two years as Crow women came and went," Elk says. "Most (researchers) don't have the patience. They just want to tell you what to do. But Suzanne totally got it."
In 2001 Messengers applied for and received an initial $768,000 grant from the American Cancer Society. It has since been renewed for an additional $1.52 million.
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