Lanaudière Native Friendship Center | Help, where there is need

(Joliette) Since the summer, the Mikinakw mobile clinic has been walking the streets of Joliette and Lanaudière almost every day. On board alternate a string of professionals united behind the same objective: to strengthen among the indigenous people of the region the feeling of cultural security, undermined in particular by the tragic death, four years ago, of Joyce Echaquan.

The clinic – the first of its kind in the province – was set up by the Lanaudière Native Friendship Center (CAAL), driven by the desire to reach its members where they are.

This Thursday at the end of August, as The Pressit is nurse Elena Tremblay who is there. There are friendly quips from her colleagues, who call her the “queen” of the clinic, an epithet greeted with a smile.

Elena’s “kingdom” was born at the end of June and she is already seeing the beneficial effect of Mikinakw, whose name means “turtle” in the Atikamekw language. “There was a need, there was demand,” she assures. She is well placed to know this: even before the mobile clinic came into operation, the nurse was in the habit of going to meet certain members.

However, she did it with the CAAL car… an “ordinary” car, she specifies, speaking of it as a distant and painful memory. Now, M^me Tremblay lacks nothing. On board Mikinakw, she offers sexual health consultations and carries out medical follow-ups and wound care, among other things. “We have condoms and naloxone kits to give to members who ask for them,” she adds. During the passage of The PressElena gives a user one of these kits that can reverse the effects of an opioid overdose.

All services whose benefits are increased tenfold, she believes, by the mobile nature of the clinic.

And the clinic transformed into a work of art – no less than eight young people contributed to its creation, helped by the Atikamekw artist Eruoma Awashis – attracts the attention of the curious. Like that of a man who, after seeing the clinic, approached M^me Tremblay to tell him about a skin problem.

The nurse was able to take care of him without delay, and provide the necessary follow-ups from the mobile clinic. However, she specifies that this is not an “emergency service”.

Meet a need

Kiki, an Indigenous woman who used CAAL services before the clinic was established, believes that Mikinakw has made her life easier. The mother of two is categorical: medical follow-ups for her sons are “much easier”. One of them recently benefited from a “lice clinic,” she says, for example.

And when she wants to “socialize”, the CAAL offices are never far away and do not suffer from the offer of mobile services. Anyone who wants can enter this building on Boulevard Sainte-Anne. As proof: the doorbell at the entrance does not work. And during the day, the door, if not wide open, remains unlocked.

This proximity to the region’s indigenous community has been a long-standing wish of CAAL.

However, almost four years ago, with the death on September 28, 2020, of Joyce Echaquan at Joliette hospital, this wish became a need for many members, seeking a feeling of cultural security.

Frédérique Provost, Mirerimowin health coordinator – a word meaning “to feel good” and which includes health, education and social intervention services – believes that the “bond of trust” with members must be maintained perpetually. “It’s a big job, [déjà qu’]he is perhaps not yet completely recovered” since the death of the 37-year-old Atikamekw under the insults of the nursing staff.

To this end, she is delighted to see that the clinic makes it possible to “create links”, particularly through local interventions. In just under three months, the clinic had already taken to the road more than a hundred times, according to M.^me Provost. She was also dispatched to Saint-Michel-des-Saints, about a hundred kilometers north of Joliette, where the CAAL also has a service center.

A world of difference

One word quickly comes to mind for street worker Anouk Comtois when she talks about the mobile clinic: “magnet.” For her, that’s where Mikinakw’s main interest lies. When she goes somewhere with the mobile clinic, “kids come out, parents come out, people know that if there is a problem, they can come see us.”

Previously, she says, she was not very visible and struggled to reach “so many people”. “ [Maintenant]it’s much easier to get to the bottom of the issues. » And like nurse Elena Tremblay, with whom she sometimes occupies the mobile clinic, she extols the virtues of “responsiveness”. Just that, it’s “a big victory”, rejoices M^me Comtois, herself an Atikamekw from Manawan.

The reserve, which accounts for some 25% of the indigenous population of Lanaudière, does not itself benefit from CAAL services. “Manawan has its own service, which is independent,” explains Anouk Comtois, who nevertheless specifies that it works in collaboration with the community of just over 2,000 souls.

And even if she doesn’t go with Mikinakw to the place where she grew up, M^me Comtois is delighted to be able to travel the region aboard the clinic. “It’s a great honor to serve my community in this way,” she said.

An upcoming move

“We’re a little cramped,” concedes Frédérique Provost, showing the CAAL offices where up to five people are sometimes crammed together. “Luckily, we’re moving soon, […] I’m so excited. » In the coming years, the organization will leave its establishment on Sainte-Anne Boulevard to set up shop in brand new facilities, not far from the Joliette hospital. CPE, cultural center, temporary housing: the new CAAL headquarters will have enough to meet many needs, believes M^me Provost.