Indigenous Health

Terms used to refer to Indigenous populations vary by country, by database, by discipline, and by whose perspective is privileged.

"For most tribes, there is one tribal term of self-reference and one other term, either corrupted from the original or entirely foreign. Sometimes those corrupted terms are more common than the more accurate ones tribes and tribal people use. Such is the case for the people the Spanish called Navajo but who call themselves Diné". (Anton Treuer, Everything You Wanted to Know About Indians But Were Afraid To Ask)

In United States research literature, as well as coloquially, people use "Native American", "American Indian", "Alaska Native", "Native", and very rarely, "Indigenous".

• The US government Office of Management and Budget established "American Indian or Alaska Native" as terms to be used in official US government documents in 1977.
• The categories used by the US Census have varied over time, and the current category used is "American Indian or Alaska Native", with other categories available for Indigenous peoples of Hawaii and the Pacific ocean.
• These terms were not developed with any kind of group consent from the communities being labeled, and may not reflect what these communities prefer to be called

In Canada

• "First Nations" was used in the past, though it does not include Métis nor Inuit people
• "Aboriginal" is used as a general term to refer to all ethnicities of people native to Canada, and has a legal definition in that country
• "Indigenous" is also used as a general term to refer to all ethnicities of people native to Canada, though it is most often used to refer to people in an international, transnational, or global context
• As in the US, within Canada the term "Indian" has a legal definition, and in CA refers to a person registered under the Indian Act

Databases use different terms to form subject headings for Indigenous peoples

To be both efficient and thorough, use both the database's subject heading for an Indigenous population as well as locally preferred terms

PubMed example:

("American Indian or Alaska Native"[Mesh] OR "Three Affiliated Tribes" OR Mandan OR Hidatsa OR Arikara OR "Fort Berthold")

CINAHL example:

((MH "Native Americans") OR "Three Affiliated Tribes" OR Mandan OR Hidatsa OR Arikara OR "Fort Berthold")