History

Overview

Since its founding in 1976, the Indian Health Care Resource Center has been an integral part of the Tulsa community. The organization is the primary source of outpatient care services for the 86,000 American Indians who live in the Tulsa metropolitan area.

Census figures show that Tulsa has one of the largest urban American Indian populations in the United States. The Tulsa Public Schools have the nation's largest public school Indian pupil enrollment. For many of Indian Health Care's clients, the center is their only source of quality health care. If the center were not able to provide preventative and acute care, many of these clients would populate the emergency rooms of local hospitals. The Center's eligibility staff assists clients in qualifying for Medicare, Medicaid, and SoonerCare insurance.

Indian Health Care provides over 34,000 unduplicated patient visits annually (up from 10,000 in 1989), a number that is steadily increasing - more than 10,000 first-time patients were seen in 1999. Health services are provided on a sliding scale basis that discounts fees according to patient income and family size. No one is ever denied care for inability to pay for services.