NAU camp aims to get more Indigenous students into healthcare [Video]

FLAGSTAFF, AZ (AZFamily) — Over the next 15 years, the Bureau of Health Workforce projects a nationwide shortage of 68,000 primary care physicians and thousands more across the healthcare field.

This will greatly impact rural and indigenous communities, but high school students at Northern Arizona University are hoping to fix that.

High schoolers from the Hopi Tribe and Navajo Nation are learning all about healthcare at a weeklong camp at NAU. This is thanks to a partnership between the university and the Colorado Plateau Center for Health Professions, previously known as the Northern Arizona Area Health Education Center.

“Northern Arizona is both rural and medically underserved, and especially in the communities these students come from,” said Sarah Frain, the Youth Health Careers Program Coordinator for the Colorado Plateau Center for Health Professions.

The goal of the program is to get more Indigenous students interested in healthcare and fill the gaps. That includes Kameron Chatter from Tuba City, who was a part of the …