About Us

Founded in September, 2003, the Northern Plains Tribal Epidemiology Center (NPTEC) is a program of the Aberdeen Area Tribal Chairmen’s Health Board (AATCHB) and one of 13 tribal epidemiology centers funded by the IHS Epidemiology Division to assist in improving the health of American Indians and Alaskan Natives throughout the United States.

Our mission is to provide leadership, technical assistance, support, and advocacy to the 18 Aberdeen Area tribal nations and communities in order to eliminate the disparities in health that currently exist for tribal people of the four-state region of Iowa, Nebraska, North Dakota and South Dakota.

Our Goals are:

1. Provide Aberdeen Area tribes with reports of timely, accurate, and useful data on health priorities based on existing data sources.
2. Improve the ability of surveillance systems to measure and monitor the health status of American Indian populations through existing tracking or surveillance systems, and development of new surveillance activities
3. Support evidence-based culturally-rooted health promotion and disease prevention initiatives in clinical and community contexts
4. Build capacity to conduct health research in collaboration with academic institutions, including tribal community colleges and tribal schools, to ensure the benefits of well designed, culturally appropriate, and ethical health research reach Northern Plains AI communities
5. Improve public health and epidemiologic capacity in Northern Plains tribal communities. Please browse our website pages to find programs that will be of benefit to you or your community. We welcome feedback and suggestions on how we can better serve and foster continuing partnerships with tribal communities.

Please contact us at:
Northern Plains Tribal Epidemiology Center
Aberdeen Area Tribal Chairmen’s Health Board
1770 Rand Road
Rapid City, SD 57702
Tel. 605-721-1922 or 1-800-745-3466
Fax. 605-721-2876
e-mail: drajaiyeola@aatchb.org
Web page: www.aatchb.org