UIHS first in California to get Medi-Cal reimbursement for traditional healing

United Indian Health Services has become the first Indian Health Care Provider in California to successfully receive Medi-Cal reimbursement for Traditional Health Care Practices, a shift that could reshape how tribal health services are paid for in Humboldt County and beyond.

The breakthrough followed federal approval on Oct. 16, 2024, when the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services signed off on California’s Section 1115 CalAIM waiver. That approval allowed Medicaid coverage for cultural healing services as part of substance-use-disorder treatment, and the California Department of Health Care Services says the benefit applies to Medi-Cal members in Drug Medi-Cal Organized Delivery System counties through Dec. 31, 2026, unless the waiver is extended or amended.

For tribal providers, the change is about more than paperwork. Traditional healing has long been part of Native wellness, recovery and community support, but it has often operated outside the reimbursement system that finances mainstream care. UIHS said it has now satisfied a claim under the new state rules, meaning those services are no longer treated only as an unfunded tradition. They can now be recognized within Medi-Cal, the public system that pays for care for low-income Californians.

California says it is one of only four states approved for Medicaid reimbursement of traditional health care practices, along with Arizona, New Mexico and Oregon. State and federal officials framed the policy as a way to improve access to culturally appropriate care and strengthen health outcomes for tribal communities, especially people receiving treatment for substance use disorders.

UIHS Chief Executive Officer Elizabeth Lara-O’Rourke called the milestone the product of decades of advocacy and community resilience, while stressing that the decision affirms what American Indian and Alaska Native communities have long understood: culture itself can be healing. The practical effect could be just as important as the symbolism. Reimbursement can help sustain services, support staffing and make it easier for tribal clinics to keep traditional practices available as part of a broader treatment model.

That model is already centered at Potawot Health Village in Arcata, at 1600 Weeot Way. UIHS says the site houses medical, dental, pharmacy and behavioral health services, alongside traditional services, giving the organization a rare chance to blend clinical care and cultural practice in one place.

UIHS began in 1968, rooted in Native self-determination and the era of Indian health activism. More than a half-century later, the organization’s first reimbursed traditional-healing claim marks a policy shift with local consequences: a Native-run health system in Humboldt County is now showing that cultural care can be paid for, sustained and built into the future of treatment access.