YKHC President/CEO Dan Winkelman’s address to 2026 Tribal Gathering delegates

Everything we do at YKHC is about improving our quality and safety. It begins with our strategic planning process, which is why we are here together, for the next two days. Our strategic planning process begins with and ends with you, the customer. You help us develop our health priorities today, and then tomorrow you use those service lines that you helped us develop.

As part of that process, we continually assess our health care system, including our medical equipment needs on an annual basis.

Believe it or not, it has been more than five years since we opened the new hospital. At that time, we invested in more than $20 million of new hospital equipment which was our largest ever capital equipment budget. Some of the hospital's medical equipment is now nearing end of life and over the next year, we will replace all of it, as well as other needed capital expenses totaling more than $13 million. This represents our second largest investment in new equipment and needed renovations. We will have new laryngoscopes, chest compressors, bedside furniture, sky lifts, dental mobile x-ray units, SRC ultrasounds, birthing model simulators, a state-of-the-art CT scan, new infusion pumps, new hospital heating pipe, various SRC equipment and furniture upgrades, and significant SRC and Bethel housing renovations which alone totals more than $5 million.

We are also anxiously awaiting to hear from our partner, the U.S. Indian Health Service, on our application to double the size of our YK Elders Home. We want to increase our service from 18 beds to constructing 36 beds in order to keep more of our elders in region with their foods, culture, language and most importantly, their families.

Lastly, since late fall, YKHC has been working with the State of Alaska on how to implement America's new $50 billion Rural Health Transformation Program. Over the five-year life of the program, it will represent more than $1.3 billion of new investment to Alaska's rural health infrastructure alone. Over the next couple of months, we will be applying to the program and will do so every year for the next five years. We plan on adding new specialty service lines like cardiology, ENT, orthopedics and others. By the end of this program, we will also have a new MRI imaging suite. We will also invest heavily in case management, our electronic health record and all related services to ensure our customers receive better and more timely access to preventative care and the necessary follow up after having procedures performed in Anchorage.

Intensive case management will allow village customers access to multiple service lines in only one visit to Bethel. We are calling this, a "one-stop visit." For example, today, to receive multiple services typically takes multiple trips to Bethel. In the future, a typical customer coming to Bethel to be seen for their annual renewal of prescriptions and blood work, will also be able to be seen for other medically necessary visits like their annual dental visit or cancer screening. This dramatic increase to in region specialty services, with new one-stop visits, will be more efficient, less costly, greatly improve timely healthcare access and will be truly transformative for our customers. It is the next right step for improving the quality and safety of our health system for the 21^st century!