Custer Health has received a grant to continue providing breast and cervical cancer screenings for all women on the Standing Rock Indian Reservation.

The $25,000 Avon Foundation Breast Care Fund grant supplements federal grants to help the Custer Health Women's Way identify uninsured and underinsured women for cervical and breast cancer screenings.

"We decided we needed to do something to make it available to all women, to identify women for Women's Way," Custer Health Women's Way Coordinator Joyce Sayler said. "(We) blend all grants to serve all women."

This is the sixth year Custer Health has received funding for the Standing Rock program through the Avon Foundation. The Centers for Disease Control give federal grant funds for breast and cervical cancer screenings for uninsured and underinsured women, which is done through the Women's Way program. The screening program on Standing Rock started in 1998.

The Standing Rock Women's Health Program at Custer Health is part of a joint program with Standing Rock Indian Health Services and tribal health. Tribal health provides outreach for the services and Custer Health coordinates the services, which are done at Standing Rock Indian Health Services clinics.

"The tribal health community health representatives are the connecting piece," Sayler said. "Initially, they were knocking door-to-door."

At the clinics, the women have their exams, and while they wait, they can learn about their health and how to keep their family healthy. At a recent screening in Fort Yates, the educational topic was reading food labels, Sayler said.

They also do things to make the women feel special while they are at the clinic. Students at Standing Rock School made Valentine's Day cards for the women.

"We try to make it special, so it is much more pleasant," Sayler said.

Since January 2002, when Custer Health starting receiving Avon Grant funding, the Standing Rock Women's Health Program has reached more than 1,750 women with information about the importance of early detection of breast cancer and has referred almost 1,250 women for mammograms and clinical breast exams.

The women's health clinics are primarily in Fort Yates and McLaughlin, S.D. There is a screening in McLaughlin on Wednesday. Future screenings will be April 5 and 19.