NIH Tribal Health Research Office Director David R. Wilson to speak at first annual ITRRC symposium today

David R. Wilson, Ph.D., Director of the National Institutes of Health’s (NIH) Tribal Health Research Office (THRO), will serve as lead speaker for the University of North Dakota Indigenous Trauma & Resilience Research Center’s (ITRRC) first annual symposium on Friday, April 22, 2022.

“American Indians in North Dakota and throughout the region suffer from significant health disparities, relative to the non-Native population, much of which is related to historical trauma, adverse childhood experiences, forced boarding school participation, and toxic stress,” explained Dr. Don Warne, ITRRC program director and director of the UND School of Medicine & Health Sciences (SMHS) Indians Into Medicine (INMED) program. “The goal of the ITRRC is to address the impact of historical and unresolved trauma on health inequities within the American Indian and Alaska Native population.”

Noting that he is looking forward to Wilson’s talk, Warne added that a secondary purpose of the Center and symposium is to bring together nationally recognized experts in Indigenous trauma and resilience and highlight the research being accomplished at UND.

Wilson, who came to the NIH from the Department of Health and Human Services Office of Minority Health where he served as Public Health Advisor and the American Indian/Alaska Native Policy Lead, fits both bills.

As the NIH puts it, the TRHO Director assembles representatives from across the NIH to leverage resources and “build collaborations through the research portfolio to address tribal health concerns.” A member of the Navajo Nation, Wilson was appointed as the first Director of the Tribal Health Research Office in Jan. 2017.

Featured event speakers include:

• David R. Wilson, Ph.D., Navajo, Director of the National Institutes of Health’s Tribal Health Research Office.
• Donald Warne, M.D., M.P.H., Oglala Lakota, Program Director for the ITRRC and INMED.
• Ursula Running Bear, Ph.D., M.S., Sicangu Lakota, Assistant Professor in UND’s Department of Population Health, teaching in the UND SMHS Public Health Program.
• Andrew Williams, Ph.D., M.P.H., Assistant Professor in UND’s Department of Population Health, teaching in the UND SMHS Public Health Program.
• Nicole Redvers, N.D., M.P.H., Deninu K’ue, Assistant Professor in the UND SMHS Departments of Indigenous Health and Family & Community Medicine.
• Alison Kelliher, M.D., Koyukon Athabascan, Director of the American Indian Collaborative Research Network (AICoRN).
• Amanda Mae Fretts, Ph.D., M.P.H., Mi’kmaq, Assistant Professor, University of Washington School of Public Health, Department of Epidemiology.

This event is free but requires registration to receive the event link. Interested participants can see the symposium schedule and register for the event at: med.UND.edu/research/cobre.

“It’s an exciting time to be doing this type of work,” concluded Warne, who helped UND establish the world’s first doctoral program in Indigenous Health and world’s first standalone Department of Indigenous Health. “And it’s incredible that the University of North Dakota has come to serve as a major center for Indigenous Health scholarship worldwide.”