Tuesday, April 27, 2010
A world without hope.
My last day in Gonaives cracked the delicate web of emotions I have so carefully woven over the past 3 weeks. The web of fear, anxiety, frustration, exhaustion, sadness, and hurt all held together with one string...the string that kept everything together, that allowed me to get up day in and day out and face the difficult conditions...the string that makes everything worth while...that string is hope. And on my last day in Goaives, that sting began to fray...
We were told that we were leaving the compound at 6am. So we were up at 5, bags packed, ready to begin our 6 hour journey to Cap Haitian where we would be flying out of to Florida 2 days later. Not expecting anyone to be on time, we settled into reading our books at about 10am. Then noon came along, then 2pm. No word on when we were leaving, what was holding us up, or if we were leaving at all. In this aspect, Haiti could be one of the most frustrating countries I have ever been to. Don't get me wrong...people are always late in the Gambia, Zambia, Botswana, Cambodia...but in those other countries, at least they have the decency and the foresight to tell the Americans who have been waiting for 8 hours what is going on and why, and when we think we may be leaving... But no, in Haiti you wait. In fact, you are considered rude if you even think to ask what is happening and if anything will be moving any time soon.
But I suppose this long and boring day of waiting had a reason. At about 3pm, the nurse from Sweden came running to our house, breathless. "There's a sick baby", she said. "The nurses can't get an IV...come help!"
We grabbed our things and ran to the hospital. When I walked in the door I was shocked and horrified. A 6 month old baby lay unconscious on a wooden table in the doorway of the hospital, one band-aid on his hand where the nurses had attempted an IV (one!!), his mother sitting close by crying and praying, the nurses sitting across the room laughing and gossiping, and Dr Ketlie wandering aimlessly around the hospital not seeming to notice the dying child. I literally felt the anger boil up inside of me. "HOW CAN YOU SIT THERE AND DO NOTHING!!" I wanted to scream! Instead I quickly assessed the infant. He was extremely dehydrated. His skin was tenting all over...in his arms, legs, hands and feet. His eyes sunken deep into his head, his fontanel a crater in his skull. I knew he needed fluids now if he was to live. We discussed placing an interosseous line. I was about to do so when we realized that the pharmacist had gone home for the day and taken the keys to the supply cupboard. How could she just lock everything up and leave when there is a dying child on the table?! I was truly baffled by the worker's indifference, their complete lack of value of human life. It was the most defeated I have ever felt. I wanted to explode with anger, curse words flying out of my mouth, but at the same time I wanted to collapse on the floor sobbing. How could none of the work we have done over the past month have sunken in? How could these people care so little for a child's life? How is it fair that 1 in 3 children dies before they reach 5 years old in Haiti?? That this has become such a natural part of life for the people that there is no drive to even save a child who only needs IV fluids?! How could I even have expected to change an entire culture and mindset in only 4 weeks? How do you teach people to value life when all their loved ones have died, and then ask them to keep surviving?
My head was spinning...my stomach tied into knots of agony and despair. The stark realization of life for a Haitian person and what they must do to survive hit me like a ton of bricks and left me reeling. I could do one thing...I could save this child. One life...that's what I needed to focus on...one life.
I ran to Pastor Michel's house. Out of breath I quickly told him about the baby and that we needed a car now! He made some phone calls...."they are on their way" he said. I ran back to the hospital, packed the baby up in mom's arms, grabbed her stuff, and we all packed into the vehicle. The driver swiftly took us to the Cuban hospital where I stayed with the baby and Jenna ran upstairs to find Dr Oswall, who knew us well now, after taking care of Ishmael. He hurried down the stairs and ushered us into the ICU. The beds were occupied so he cleared off the wooden desk, laid the child upon it, and went to work trying to place a line. All of his veins were collapsed. Even the external jugular collapsed when touched, so placing an IV into any of them was close to impossible. Dr Oswall attempted IJs and central lines for almost 2 hours with us helping by holding the infant in distorted positions to make the veins more available. Finally after hundreds of attempts and failures and one infiltrated line into the neck, he was successful at placing a stable intra-jugular line and began to quickly resuscitate fluids into the depleted infant. He should be okay now, but he had quite a distended belly, so the doctor was going to run some tests as he administered fluids over the next few days. We thanked him again for saving us, climbed back in the car and headed back to the mission.
So many emotions came tumbling into the forefront of my mind. So much pain, loss, hurt, and despair. A culture of people who had essentially become fatalists. Who had lost the one thing humans cling to in order to survive, to give us meaning...hope. Without hope, what is it that drives us to rise each morning and go on living? Without hope how does one continue to exist? How does one teach people to value human life when it is being snatched from them everyday? When they starve and cannot find food, get sick and have no access to medicine, become dehydrated and have no available water? And then, on top of all this, the earth trembles beneath them, the sky comes down in sheets of water, and every little thing they have held on to just to survive is washed away or crushed beneath the rubble. And then we ask them to have hope....
We were told that we were leaving the compound at 6am. So we were up at 5, bags packed, ready to begin our 6 hour journey to Cap Haitian where we would be flying out of to Florida 2 days later. Not expecting anyone to be on time, we settled into reading our books at about 10am. Then noon came along, then 2pm. No word on when we were leaving, what was holding us up, or if we were leaving at all. In this aspect, Haiti could be one of the most frustrating countries I have ever been to. Don't get me wrong...people are always late in the Gambia, Zambia, Botswana, Cambodia...but in those other countries, at least they have the decency and the foresight to tell the Americans who have been waiting for 8 hours what is going on and why, and when we think we may be leaving... But no, in Haiti you wait. In fact, you are considered rude if you even think to ask what is happening and if anything will be moving any time soon.
But I suppose this long and boring day of waiting had a reason. At about 3pm, the nurse from Sweden came running to our house, breathless. "There's a sick baby", she said. "The nurses can't get an IV...come help!"
We grabbed our things and ran to the hospital. When I walked in the door I was shocked and horrified. A 6 month old baby lay unconscious on a wooden table in the doorway of the hospital, one band-aid on his hand where the nurses had attempted an IV (one!!), his mother sitting close by crying and praying, the nurses sitting across the room laughing and gossiping, and Dr Ketlie wandering aimlessly around the hospital not seeming to notice the dying child. I literally felt the anger boil up inside of me. "HOW CAN YOU SIT THERE AND DO NOTHING!!" I wanted to scream! Instead I quickly assessed the infant. He was extremely dehydrated. His skin was tenting all over...in his arms, legs, hands and feet. His eyes sunken deep into his head, his fontanel a crater in his skull. I knew he needed fluids now if he was to live. We discussed placing an interosseous line. I was about to do so when we realized that the pharmacist had gone home for the day and taken the keys to the supply cupboard. How could she just lock everything up and leave when there is a dying child on the table?! I was truly baffled by the worker's indifference, their complete lack of value of human life. It was the most defeated I have ever felt. I wanted to explode with anger, curse words flying out of my mouth, but at the same time I wanted to collapse on the floor sobbing. How could none of the work we have done over the past month have sunken in? How could these people care so little for a child's life? How is it fair that 1 in 3 children dies before they reach 5 years old in Haiti?? That this has become such a natural part of life for the people that there is no drive to even save a child who only needs IV fluids?! How could I even have expected to change an entire culture and mindset in only 4 weeks? How do you teach people to value life when all their loved ones have died, and then ask them to keep surviving?
My head was spinning...my stomach tied into knots of agony and despair. The stark realization of life for a Haitian person and what they must do to survive hit me like a ton of bricks and left me reeling. I could do one thing...I could save this child. One life...that's what I needed to focus on...one life.
I ran to Pastor Michel's house. Out of breath I quickly told him about the baby and that we needed a car now! He made some phone calls...."they are on their way" he said. I ran back to the hospital, packed the baby up in mom's arms, grabbed her stuff, and we all packed into the vehicle. The driver swiftly took us to the Cuban hospital where I stayed with the baby and Jenna ran upstairs to find Dr Oswall, who knew us well now, after taking care of Ishmael. He hurried down the stairs and ushered us into the ICU. The beds were occupied so he cleared off the wooden desk, laid the child upon it, and went to work trying to place a line. All of his veins were collapsed. Even the external jugular collapsed when touched, so placing an IV into any of them was close to impossible. Dr Oswall attempted IJs and central lines for almost 2 hours with us helping by holding the infant in distorted positions to make the veins more available. Finally after hundreds of attempts and failures and one infiltrated line into the neck, he was successful at placing a stable intra-jugular line and began to quickly resuscitate fluids into the depleted infant. He should be okay now, but he had quite a distended belly, so the doctor was going to run some tests as he administered fluids over the next few days. We thanked him again for saving us, climbed back in the car and headed back to the mission.
So many emotions came tumbling into the forefront of my mind. So much pain, loss, hurt, and despair. A culture of people who had essentially become fatalists. Who had lost the one thing humans cling to in order to survive, to give us meaning...hope. Without hope, what is it that drives us to rise each morning and go on living? Without hope how does one continue to exist? How does one teach people to value human life when it is being snatched from them everyday? When they starve and cannot find food, get sick and have no access to medicine, become dehydrated and have no available water? And then, on top of all this, the earth trembles beneath them, the sky comes down in sheets of water, and every little thing they have held on to just to survive is washed away or crushed beneath the rubble. And then we ask them to have hope....
Sunday, April 25, 2010
People United for a New Haiti
So, after the scary bus ride, we settled into our hotel and began to prepare for the weekend conference. Surprising to us, after witnessing the lack of organization or planning in Haiti, more than 200 people arrived from across the world for the conference. Jenna and I were assigned the jobs of having the people register as they arrive and receive name tags and folders for the conference. The speakers looked very prestigious, seated on stage in suits and ties. The English speaking people sat in the back with our translator. Unfortunately, the translator wasn't really able to understand the complexity of the speakers' words, and with his limited English, transform the true meaning of the speeches into relevant English. So the message was lost to us, and we were quickly bored. So instead, Jenna and I decided to enjoy our few days at the beach and swim and sunbathe to our hearts content. Each day, a bus of US Army came to the hotel and paid for a day pass to enjoy the luxurious beach and sparkling waters. We spoke with most and they expressed their surprise and elation and seeing other white people. They seemed like misfits in this country...when asked what exactly they were doing here, they answered "playing cards". It's an interesting notion to me that America would spend all this money to have so many US soldiers just sitting on base in Haiti playing cards all day. When I asked why they weren't undertaking projects to help rebuild the broken country, they simply stated that it was not their job. It seems amiss to me that America will send our soldiers over to "help" the people of Haiti in case their could be a military uprising, but we refuse to assist them in their state of deprivation, starvation, and homelessness.
The conference appeared to be a very good thing. Some important people spoke about the idea of "decentralizing" Haiti, of moving everyone out of the capital of Port-au-Prince, and rebuilding the country elsewhere. Some of this was explained to Jenna, who later passed on the knowledge to me. Port-au-Prince is built on a fault line, and the soil is such that it essentially melts when the earth shakes. This is not something that we can change, and even building earthquake-resistant houses would be futile under such circumstances. During the quake, only 30% of the fault line was shifted, thus there is another 70% of the land just waiting to break apart and reap further devastation upon the city. It is not a question of if, but when. If they re-build Port-au-Prince, the country is doomed. So the concept of 'decentralization' is the push to move the country out of that main city and begin re-building elsewhere. Of building up the existing, smaller cities, to accommodate the mass exodus out of Port-au-Prince. There was a big push for education, for committing our time to teach the youth and instruct them how to lift the country out of poverty. How change cannot come in a day, or a week, or a year. That it takes 2 generations of people to bring about change...
On the way back from the conference, we shared a bus with a new group of volunteers. They were from the US and Canada, architects, builders, financiers. All here to build a community of houses in Gonaives that could stand as an example of cheap, efficient way of how houses could be built across Haiti. Their houses would be built from cement, soil from the local river, and a melted plastic solution - all raw materials found in Haiti. They would pour this mixture into a form, let the house sit for 2 days, remove the form and there would be the house! It took 14 men to build, would employ Haitian people, would sleep a family of 10, and would only cost $8000 people per house! Oh yeah, and they are water resistant, and hurricane and earthquake proof. They are building a community of 50 houses on Pastor Michel's land to serve as an example of how successful these houses can be and then hopefully begin on rebuilding communities across Haiti. They were a very inspiring group of men, who had spent a lot of time in Haiti over the years, and were extremely knowledgeable of the needs and how to help.
We got back to the compound safely and let loose a sigh of relief....2 days left at the compound, a long trip to Cap Haitian, then we'd be off back to America. I could handle the tarantulas, mosquitoes, lack of food, no running water, and heat for 4 more days....
The conference appeared to be a very good thing. Some important people spoke about the idea of "decentralizing" Haiti, of moving everyone out of the capital of Port-au-Prince, and rebuilding the country elsewhere. Some of this was explained to Jenna, who later passed on the knowledge to me. Port-au-Prince is built on a fault line, and the soil is such that it essentially melts when the earth shakes. This is not something that we can change, and even building earthquake-resistant houses would be futile under such circumstances. During the quake, only 30% of the fault line was shifted, thus there is another 70% of the land just waiting to break apart and reap further devastation upon the city. It is not a question of if, but when. If they re-build Port-au-Prince, the country is doomed. So the concept of 'decentralization' is the push to move the country out of that main city and begin re-building elsewhere. Of building up the existing, smaller cities, to accommodate the mass exodus out of Port-au-Prince. There was a big push for education, for committing our time to teach the youth and instruct them how to lift the country out of poverty. How change cannot come in a day, or a week, or a year. That it takes 2 generations of people to bring about change...
On the way back from the conference, we shared a bus with a new group of volunteers. They were from the US and Canada, architects, builders, financiers. All here to build a community of houses in Gonaives that could stand as an example of cheap, efficient way of how houses could be built across Haiti. Their houses would be built from cement, soil from the local river, and a melted plastic solution - all raw materials found in Haiti. They would pour this mixture into a form, let the house sit for 2 days, remove the form and there would be the house! It took 14 men to build, would employ Haitian people, would sleep a family of 10, and would only cost $8000 people per house! Oh yeah, and they are water resistant, and hurricane and earthquake proof. They are building a community of 50 houses on Pastor Michel's land to serve as an example of how successful these houses can be and then hopefully begin on rebuilding communities across Haiti. They were a very inspiring group of men, who had spent a lot of time in Haiti over the years, and were extremely knowledgeable of the needs and how to help.
We got back to the compound safely and let loose a sigh of relief....2 days left at the compound, a long trip to Cap Haitian, then we'd be off back to America. I could handle the tarantulas, mosquitoes, lack of food, no running water, and heat for 4 more days....
Tuesday, April 20, 2010
A day I will never forget.
The single most terrifying day of my life.
Ok, I realize that's not saying much. I live one of the easiest, safest lives possible, sprinkled with adventure in the developing world every now and again. But I'm pretty sure that the events last Wednesday would scare anyone, anyone who values their own life and watches the news or reads the travel warnings for Haiti, that is! (thanks Mom!)
So, we started the day like any other....clinic in the morning, rice and beans for lunch, waiting for the bus that was 2 hours late...a standard day in Haiti. Actually, the morning had been a sad but successful one at the hospital. That tiny malnourished infant that we saw last week came back in to the clinic weighing 7 pounds 10 ounces. That's 2 ounces less than last week! This child was literally starving to death in front of our eyes. I asked the mother the last time the child had eaten and she said 2 days ago. After rushing off to get food for the infant, her 9 year old brother, and the mother, I sat down to talk to them with the baby in my arms, all three wolfing down the food I had brought. The mother communicated to me that, although she wad trying, she could only get food for herself and her children about every 3 days.. Luckily, we spoke with the psychologist who works out of the clinic and he knew how to get the family into a food program for starving children at another hospital! I was so relieved and happy. Finally this infant and her family would be getting the nutrients they needed! But I still felt incredibly sad. Could this infant ever grow up to be completely mentally normal after being deprived of essential nutrients for the first 6 months of her life? How many other children were there out there in the same situation? And this child had a mother! What about the orphans? There are 350 thousand orphans in the city of Port au Prince alone! What do they do when they're hungry? Who do they have to bring them into the clinic?? I try to take solace in the fact that we reached out to one family...possibly saved one life...but is that enough?
But I digress....back to the bus ride. So the bus ride started out as any other bus ride in a developing nation. Flying down a dirt road entirely too fast, rocks flying up around us, a few near misses at head on collisions, and horns blaring away, each bus trying to claim the rights to the road by being the loudest and the pushiest. Our bus was not full....we had 4 Americans, a Swedish nurse, a Canadian, the pastor and his son and friend, 2 strange guys who no one appeared to know sitting in the front, the bus driver and his sidekick, an evil looking man with a Hitler mustache and beady eyes. I took no notice of the men in the front and focused all my energy to clinging on for dear life every time we hit a bump or a curve. That is, until we got to Point Sante, a village about an hour south of Gonaives. The road was crowded and the bus slowed to a crawl...the market was going on all around the bus. People selling vegetables, water, fish, and other bits and bobs, trying to make a living. One man climbed on the bus trying to sell his bags of water to the blancos. The beady eyed mustache man began yelling at him and in a flash an argument had begun. They were yelling at each other in Creole, so of course we didn't understand a word of it. Next thing we knew, the water vendor had been pushed off the bus and began throwing his precious merchandise at the bus in a burst of anger. The water bags hit the bus and burst open, causing no damage besides wet streaks down the side of the bus. But this was enough to set Hitler mustache off. He jumped up, produced a metal rod from somewhere and ran off the bus. We watched from above as he clobbered the man twice over the shoulder with his weapon. He then jumped back on the bus and we began to pull away from the angry crowd that had gathered around the bus. But they knew the road and the town, and the angry water merchant continued to run after the bus. The pastors son quickly shuffled Jenna up to the middle of the bus where they felt we were safest. Just 100 yards up the road there was a road block. We slowed to a stop as the water boy caught up to the bus. 'Bang!' I heard a rock hit the bus and my body began trembling. 'They have a gun!' I heard Jenna yell and I dove to the floor of the bus. ' Bang! Bang!' I heard 2 more times, louder, echoing in my ears. I looked up to see the 2 strangers from the front of the bus standing by the window 5 feet from me, guns in both of their hand with a cloud of smoke rising from the pistols. I couldn't breath, couldn't think, couldn't move. I lay on the floor of the bus paralyzed, wondering if I was going to die. In a blur of what seemed like eternity we made it through the road block and drove a little way up the road before they pulled over and Hitler ran out into the desert brush. I had no idea why they were stopping when I was sure there was and angry mob in hot pursuit of the bus who would arrive at any second and take revenge on the entire bus. It wasn't until hours later that it came to our realization of what they were doing....disposing of the guns. Only minutes later a motorcycle drove up next to us and in shock an horror we realized it was the water merchant in the middle, shirt soaked in blood, unconscious and being held between the driver and another friend on the back of the bike. We were terrified. Should we help them? Is there anything we could do for the boy? Where was the closest hospital? And could jenna and I help him if we brought him on board? Would they kill us if we stopped? In the end, Claire refused to let us bring him on board and we knew there was not much we could do for him without getting him to a hospital asap. I laid my head down, closed my eyes and as my body shook with fear I recited in my head ' please let him be ok, please let him be ok, please let me live...' Soon the motorcycle arrived in the next city and they turned off the main road, headed for the hospital. About 20minutes later we arrived at another road block at the police station. The police made us stop and made the driver and his associates get out of the bus. There was a lot of yelling...I guess the water boy's friends had beat us to the roadblock. We pulled the bus over and waited for 3 hours while they were in the police station. Finally the bus driver got back on the bus. Everyone got back on except one of the shooters. A shiver went down my spine as beady eyes climbed back on a took a seat in the front. The last 30 minutes of the ride were in complete silence. When we arrived at the hotel Jenna and I booked and paid for our own room, away from everyone else. We needed to be as far away as we could. Regardless of the distance, I did not stop trembling the rest of the day or night.
Ok, I realize that's not saying much. I live one of the easiest, safest lives possible, sprinkled with adventure in the developing world every now and again. But I'm pretty sure that the events last Wednesday would scare anyone, anyone who values their own life and watches the news or reads the travel warnings for Haiti, that is! (thanks Mom!)
So, we started the day like any other....clinic in the morning, rice and beans for lunch, waiting for the bus that was 2 hours late...a standard day in Haiti. Actually, the morning had been a sad but successful one at the hospital. That tiny malnourished infant that we saw last week came back in to the clinic weighing 7 pounds 10 ounces. That's 2 ounces less than last week! This child was literally starving to death in front of our eyes. I asked the mother the last time the child had eaten and she said 2 days ago. After rushing off to get food for the infant, her 9 year old brother, and the mother, I sat down to talk to them with the baby in my arms, all three wolfing down the food I had brought. The mother communicated to me that, although she wad trying, she could only get food for herself and her children about every 3 days.. Luckily, we spoke with the psychologist who works out of the clinic and he knew how to get the family into a food program for starving children at another hospital! I was so relieved and happy. Finally this infant and her family would be getting the nutrients they needed! But I still felt incredibly sad. Could this infant ever grow up to be completely mentally normal after being deprived of essential nutrients for the first 6 months of her life? How many other children were there out there in the same situation? And this child had a mother! What about the orphans? There are 350 thousand orphans in the city of Port au Prince alone! What do they do when they're hungry? Who do they have to bring them into the clinic?? I try to take solace in the fact that we reached out to one family...possibly saved one life...but is that enough?
But I digress....back to the bus ride. So the bus ride started out as any other bus ride in a developing nation. Flying down a dirt road entirely too fast, rocks flying up around us, a few near misses at head on collisions, and horns blaring away, each bus trying to claim the rights to the road by being the loudest and the pushiest. Our bus was not full....we had 4 Americans, a Swedish nurse, a Canadian, the pastor and his son and friend, 2 strange guys who no one appeared to know sitting in the front, the bus driver and his sidekick, an evil looking man with a Hitler mustache and beady eyes. I took no notice of the men in the front and focused all my energy to clinging on for dear life every time we hit a bump or a curve. That is, until we got to Point Sante, a village about an hour south of Gonaives. The road was crowded and the bus slowed to a crawl...the market was going on all around the bus. People selling vegetables, water, fish, and other bits and bobs, trying to make a living. One man climbed on the bus trying to sell his bags of water to the blancos. The beady eyed mustache man began yelling at him and in a flash an argument had begun. They were yelling at each other in Creole, so of course we didn't understand a word of it. Next thing we knew, the water vendor had been pushed off the bus and began throwing his precious merchandise at the bus in a burst of anger. The water bags hit the bus and burst open, causing no damage besides wet streaks down the side of the bus. But this was enough to set Hitler mustache off. He jumped up, produced a metal rod from somewhere and ran off the bus. We watched from above as he clobbered the man twice over the shoulder with his weapon. He then jumped back on the bus and we began to pull away from the angry crowd that had gathered around the bus. But they knew the road and the town, and the angry water merchant continued to run after the bus. The pastors son quickly shuffled Jenna up to the middle of the bus where they felt we were safest. Just 100 yards up the road there was a road block. We slowed to a stop as the water boy caught up to the bus. 'Bang!' I heard a rock hit the bus and my body began trembling. 'They have a gun!' I heard Jenna yell and I dove to the floor of the bus. ' Bang! Bang!' I heard 2 more times, louder, echoing in my ears. I looked up to see the 2 strangers from the front of the bus standing by the window 5 feet from me, guns in both of their hand with a cloud of smoke rising from the pistols. I couldn't breath, couldn't think, couldn't move. I lay on the floor of the bus paralyzed, wondering if I was going to die. In a blur of what seemed like eternity we made it through the road block and drove a little way up the road before they pulled over and Hitler ran out into the desert brush. I had no idea why they were stopping when I was sure there was and angry mob in hot pursuit of the bus who would arrive at any second and take revenge on the entire bus. It wasn't until hours later that it came to our realization of what they were doing....disposing of the guns. Only minutes later a motorcycle drove up next to us and in shock an horror we realized it was the water merchant in the middle, shirt soaked in blood, unconscious and being held between the driver and another friend on the back of the bike. We were terrified. Should we help them? Is there anything we could do for the boy? Where was the closest hospital? And could jenna and I help him if we brought him on board? Would they kill us if we stopped? In the end, Claire refused to let us bring him on board and we knew there was not much we could do for him without getting him to a hospital asap. I laid my head down, closed my eyes and as my body shook with fear I recited in my head ' please let him be ok, please let him be ok, please let me live...' Soon the motorcycle arrived in the next city and they turned off the main road, headed for the hospital. About 20minutes later we arrived at another road block at the police station. The police made us stop and made the driver and his associates get out of the bus. There was a lot of yelling...I guess the water boy's friends had beat us to the roadblock. We pulled the bus over and waited for 3 hours while they were in the police station. Finally the bus driver got back on the bus. Everyone got back on except one of the shooters. A shiver went down my spine as beady eyes climbed back on a took a seat in the front. The last 30 minutes of the ride were in complete silence. When we arrived at the hotel Jenna and I booked and paid for our own room, away from everyone else. We needed to be as far away as we could. Regardless of the distance, I did not stop trembling the rest of the day or night.
Sunday, April 11, 2010
Progress...
After our crazy hectic day with Ishmael, clinic has been quite manageable, albeit busy. We have been seeing about 25 patients per day from about 8am - 2pm. As a third year medical student, this is way more than I am accustomed to, but we believe we are doing a good job of still managing to get good histories and physical exams while trying to move things along so that everyone gets a chance to be seen and is not waiting all day (many of the patients arrive at sunrise to see us). We are trying to teach the nurses how to triage patients (assign priority to the patients who are very sick and need to be seen straight away). Since the nurses don't really understand how to take a history or anything, we are running on a system when they come and get us if a patient "looks sick" or has a fever. Not exactly accurate triage...but better than nothing!
The main illness we are seeing are upper respiratory infections, arthritis, STDs, asthma (not surprising with the amount of dust!!), loss of appetite (probably due to anemia...everyone is anemic!!), and diarrhea. We've had a couple of kids with dysentery, some obviously malnourished, and many dehydrated. We had one little infant who was brought in to the clinic by the psychologist when he took one look at her. She was 6 month old and apparently her mother had only given her water since birth. She was skin a bone...looked about 1 week old, weighed only 7 pounds and 12 ounces! Poor little thing... She also had a fever and was looking quite sick. We started an IV on her and gave her some antibiotics and bean sauce and water. In a few hours she began to perk up and looked much better, but still extremely malnourished. We don't know if the mother was completely incompetent, or was so starving herself that she had just neglected her infant. We spoke to her in length about the importance of feeding the child or she would surely die. She promised to bring the infant back this week so that we could assess her weight gain.
The afternoons have been spent giving lectures to the staff at the hospital on different illnesses, questions to ask patients when they come in with back pain, treatment strategies, how to suture a wound, etc. And CLEANING!! Ugh...the storage room is coming along....slowly...
Now that we have removed many boxes we have unearthed rat pee and droppings so the place reeks! We have almost completely finished cleaning out the room, all the boxes, broken down bed frames, non-functioning EKG machine, rusty "water birthing bed" etc...all sorts of junk in the room! The locals who are helping us (the hospital staff) although well intentioned, continue to open boxes, shift things around, and place boxes in a new place on the floor. We are trying to explain to them that that strategy does not help the situation, that in order to make this store room functioning, so staff can come in and grab the supplies that they need and not be rat-infested, things need to be organised better...with no boxes on the floor! supplies out so people can see them or clearly labeled, and the place mopped and scrubbed to a shine. We have communicated this hundreds of times, but I am not sure if it falls on deaf ears. At least we can clean it best we can while we are here, and then they can do what they want with it when we leave...
So...good news today! We have been invited by the Pastor to attend a conference this week called "The Development of a New Haiti". He wants us to go and speak to the people about our ideas on how to turn around the country and bring the necessities such as food, water, and health care to the poorest people of the land. There are 250 people from all around Haiti, Europe, and the US attending to listen to talks, hold workshops etc. We are hoping that this could be a good opportunity to make a lasting impression on a large population of people all across the country, who can bring what they learn back to their communities and bring people together for the greater good of the entire nation! I'm really excited about the opportunity! And....I'm not going to lie...about the hotel!! We're going to stay in a hotel with running water!! and a POOL and a beach at the OCEAN!!! And potentially good food! You have noooooo idea how excited Jenna and I are about this! We have been missing running water so much! You never quite feel clean dumping a bucket of water over your head for a shower...and the food (although it has improved in the past couple of days) has been pretty disgusting! Rice and beans for every meal with the occasional whole fish thrown in, or goat meat on the bone...I don't consider myself a picky eater...but in the extremely hot weather...some of the food is quite hard to stomach. What I would do for some vegetables!!! And a flushing toilet...oh what a luxury!! It's funny the little things that we take for granted everyday....
Well, this week should be a crazy week in the clinic! We will be training Dr Ketlie, a local doctor who will be taking our place when we leave. We also will only have one translator this week, so clinic may move slowly! We are hoping to inspire enough confidence in Dr Ketlie that she can run the clinic on her own on Thursday and Friday while we are away at the conference. This will be her test run for when we leave completely (in a week and a half!). I hope she can handle it on her own! Although shy, and maybe lacking a bit in knowledge, I feel that she's learned a lot from watching us these past few weeks, and I'm confident that she can do a pretty good job on her own if she puts her mind to it...
We also want to finish cleaning the storage room and also the surgery room and the x-ray room before we leave...then the hospital will be in good shape. Ready to start up and running!! So...busy week ahead! It's all been EXTREMELY hard work...but I'm proud of what we have accomplished, and I hope that this can all leave a lasting impact on the people of Haiti!
The main illness we are seeing are upper respiratory infections, arthritis, STDs, asthma (not surprising with the amount of dust!!), loss of appetite (probably due to anemia...everyone is anemic!!), and diarrhea. We've had a couple of kids with dysentery, some obviously malnourished, and many dehydrated. We had one little infant who was brought in to the clinic by the psychologist when he took one look at her. She was 6 month old and apparently her mother had only given her water since birth. She was skin a bone...looked about 1 week old, weighed only 7 pounds and 12 ounces! Poor little thing... She also had a fever and was looking quite sick. We started an IV on her and gave her some antibiotics and bean sauce and water. In a few hours she began to perk up and looked much better, but still extremely malnourished. We don't know if the mother was completely incompetent, or was so starving herself that she had just neglected her infant. We spoke to her in length about the importance of feeding the child or she would surely die. She promised to bring the infant back this week so that we could assess her weight gain.
The afternoons have been spent giving lectures to the staff at the hospital on different illnesses, questions to ask patients when they come in with back pain, treatment strategies, how to suture a wound, etc. And CLEANING!! Ugh...the storage room is coming along....slowly...
Now that we have removed many boxes we have unearthed rat pee and droppings so the place reeks! We have almost completely finished cleaning out the room, all the boxes, broken down bed frames, non-functioning EKG machine, rusty "water birthing bed" etc...all sorts of junk in the room! The locals who are helping us (the hospital staff) although well intentioned, continue to open boxes, shift things around, and place boxes in a new place on the floor. We are trying to explain to them that that strategy does not help the situation, that in order to make this store room functioning, so staff can come in and grab the supplies that they need and not be rat-infested, things need to be organised better...with no boxes on the floor! supplies out so people can see them or clearly labeled, and the place mopped and scrubbed to a shine. We have communicated this hundreds of times, but I am not sure if it falls on deaf ears. At least we can clean it best we can while we are here, and then they can do what they want with it when we leave...
So...good news today! We have been invited by the Pastor to attend a conference this week called "The Development of a New Haiti". He wants us to go and speak to the people about our ideas on how to turn around the country and bring the necessities such as food, water, and health care to the poorest people of the land. There are 250 people from all around Haiti, Europe, and the US attending to listen to talks, hold workshops etc. We are hoping that this could be a good opportunity to make a lasting impression on a large population of people all across the country, who can bring what they learn back to their communities and bring people together for the greater good of the entire nation! I'm really excited about the opportunity! And....I'm not going to lie...about the hotel!! We're going to stay in a hotel with running water!! and a POOL and a beach at the OCEAN!!! And potentially good food! You have noooooo idea how excited Jenna and I are about this! We have been missing running water so much! You never quite feel clean dumping a bucket of water over your head for a shower...and the food (although it has improved in the past couple of days) has been pretty disgusting! Rice and beans for every meal with the occasional whole fish thrown in, or goat meat on the bone...I don't consider myself a picky eater...but in the extremely hot weather...some of the food is quite hard to stomach. What I would do for some vegetables!!! And a flushing toilet...oh what a luxury!! It's funny the little things that we take for granted everyday....
Well, this week should be a crazy week in the clinic! We will be training Dr Ketlie, a local doctor who will be taking our place when we leave. We also will only have one translator this week, so clinic may move slowly! We are hoping to inspire enough confidence in Dr Ketlie that she can run the clinic on her own on Thursday and Friday while we are away at the conference. This will be her test run for when we leave completely (in a week and a half!). I hope she can handle it on her own! Although shy, and maybe lacking a bit in knowledge, I feel that she's learned a lot from watching us these past few weeks, and I'm confident that she can do a pretty good job on her own if she puts her mind to it...
We also want to finish cleaning the storage room and also the surgery room and the x-ray room before we leave...then the hospital will be in good shape. Ready to start up and running!! So...busy week ahead! It's all been EXTREMELY hard work...but I'm proud of what we have accomplished, and I hope that this can all leave a lasting impact on the people of Haiti!
Wednesday, April 7, 2010
Ishmael
The hospital work has been anything but dull....
I forgot to mention that on Easter, we were called out of Church to run across to the hospital because a 19 year old boy had just drunk a bottle of Clorox bleach and was obtunded. We rushed across the road, Jenna calling poison control as we ran. Luckily, besides being an irritant and possibly leaving a severe burn in the patient's mouth, esophagus, and stomach, Clorox is not supposed to be deadly. When we arrived, the mother had already forced her son to vomit and he was lying still on the bed, eyes rolled back in his head. We quickly assessed vitals and response to pain. As the nurse placed an IV, we held his head up and poured water into his mouth. Luckily, he could still swallow. We were able to get a couple of bottles of water and milk down him and he started to come around. He was arousable to his name, although he could not say much. We left him to recover and by the next day, he was sitting up in bed eating breakfast when we arrived at the hospital.
But yesterday was the real challenge...this is when we met Ishmael.
After seeing about 15 patients in the morning, things running smoothly and patients seeming satisfied, a distressed mother came into the room holding her baby. One look and I realized something wasn't right. The babies' head was very out of porportion to his size, and although only 6 months old, his sutures appeared extremely wide...the front suture was about 1.5 inches apart. "What's going on" I asked the mother, through the translator. Mother tells me that her 6 month old son had been sick since Saturday, vomiting, diarrhea, fever, and his head was getting bigger acutely since Saturday. I called over to Jenna who was seeing a patient on the other side of the room...."I think this child has meningitis, and hydrocephalus, and I don't know what to do!" We both agreed to try and call a doctor at SLU or Cardinal Glennon and seek help, as we knew we were in over our heads. After many transfers, I was finally place on the line with Dr Warren. He walked me through the treatment of meningitis, the IV fluid boluses we needed to give the infant, and the way to administer the fluid if we couldn't get an IV line due to severe dehydration. I relayed this all to the nurse, aquired the anitbiotics to be administered, and cleaned a crib for the baby to stay in. The nurse took the supplies and I reluctantly went back to my other patients. About an hour later, between patients, I went to check on the baby. I had not heard anything from the nurses, so I assumed everything was going okay. Unfortunately, my assumption was completely incorrrect. I walked up to the nurses sitting around the infant, dumbfounded, trying to pour Pedialyte into his mouth. There was no IV in place, and the infant was no longer moving...he was completely floppy, being held by his mother, his eyes rolled back in his head. I looked at the nurses, shocked, scared, amazed. It was translated to me that they could not get an IV started due to his severe dehydration. I was angry that no one had come to tell me, but it was not an appropriate time for anger.
I yelled for Jenna to come and help me and rushed off to the storage room where I had seen an NG tube the day before. I searched for veins to start an IV, but to no avail. With Jenna talking me through it, I inserted the NG tube and quickly hooked it up to Lactated Ringers. Then I grabbed the antibiotics and administered them IM. After the infant was stable, I went back outside and called Dr Warren back. After describing Ishmael's breathing, his pinpoint pupils, and his obtunded state, Dr Warren said that it sounded like he was beginning the stages of brain herniation. I choked back tears, 'please...no...I can't let him die....' I was thinking, but trying to push back my emotion and listen carefully to Dr Warren's descriptions on how to intubate him, to hyperventilate him and vasoconstrict the vessels in his brain to decrease the pressure. He also explained how to insert an intra-osseous line into the baby's tibia to administer fluids, as the NG tube is suboptimal for absorbing the fluids in the way that this baby needed.
I got off the phone and the baby appeared as if he was improving slightly...he was crying! Oh how good that cry sounded to my ears! I got a 16 gauge needle and inserted it into the baby's tiny leg, feeling the bone crack beneath my needle and drawing back bone marrow. I was in!! My very first intra-osseous line, and I got it first time! We hooked it up to the IV fluids.
In the meantime, we were working on getting the infant transportation to an Emergency Room in town. Finally, 6 hours after the baby had arrived and we had put the car search in action, a vehile arrived. I jumped into the car, infant in my arms. Jenna sat in back and held the baby's IV fluids and IO line. And we rushed to town. The man who drove us, charged us $10 US, a ridiculous amount in this country to drive 20 minutes. And then he insisted on stopping along the way to talk to some friends because he was supposed to have a meeting!! He left us sitting in the car in the sun, I sat their sheilding his eyes from the sun and listening carefully for breath sounds to make sure he was still alive as he had become obtunded again. I could not believe our driver!! I wanted to yell and scream, but instead I fought back tears and prayed that this baby did not die in my arms. We stopped again once more to get gas before finally arriving at the hospital. I ran into the back entrance and told the gaurd to quickly get a doctor. Within seconds, a Cuban doctor came down the hallway and ushered us into a room. I quickly told him the baby's history and what has transpired throughout the day. Without hesitation he ushered us into a clean, white washed room with monitors!! And runnning water!! And hospital beds! I was amazed and shocked by the high standard of this ICU! Within 2 minutes the doctor and nurse had placed a central line and were pumping fluids into the infant. I exhaled...
I could breath for the first time that day. Finally, the baby was in good hands! I could not even express my gratitude to the Cuban doctors. Thank you for being in this country! Thank you for being here! Thank you thank you thank you!!
As I walked out of the hospital after exchanging numbers with the doctor and a promise that he would call with any news, I was blind sided by two arms around me in a huge embrace. I turned and looked...it was Ishmael's mother, arms wrapped around me. "Thank you..." she said in broken English. Then hugged Jenna and disappeared into the hospital. I was so happy, but still nervous.
Today I went back to the Cuban hospital. There was Ishmael, awake and crying in his bed! We did an ultrasound of his brain and the hydrocephalus was not at a level that the physician was worried. He said they would keep Ishmael in the hospital for 3 more days to administer IV antibiotics and fluids and then they would discharge him with close follow up to monitor the size of his head and ensure he is not building up fluid. I know he is in good hands now, and he will be okay. I think I felt, for the first time, the most terrifying feeling of almost having a baby die in my hands, with no higher authority to turn to, and the incredible bond I felt to Ishmael after feeling that I helped in saving his life. I will be forever changed by this experience.
I forgot to mention that on Easter, we were called out of Church to run across to the hospital because a 19 year old boy had just drunk a bottle of Clorox bleach and was obtunded. We rushed across the road, Jenna calling poison control as we ran. Luckily, besides being an irritant and possibly leaving a severe burn in the patient's mouth, esophagus, and stomach, Clorox is not supposed to be deadly. When we arrived, the mother had already forced her son to vomit and he was lying still on the bed, eyes rolled back in his head. We quickly assessed vitals and response to pain. As the nurse placed an IV, we held his head up and poured water into his mouth. Luckily, he could still swallow. We were able to get a couple of bottles of water and milk down him and he started to come around. He was arousable to his name, although he could not say much. We left him to recover and by the next day, he was sitting up in bed eating breakfast when we arrived at the hospital.
But yesterday was the real challenge...this is when we met Ishmael.
After seeing about 15 patients in the morning, things running smoothly and patients seeming satisfied, a distressed mother came into the room holding her baby. One look and I realized something wasn't right. The babies' head was very out of porportion to his size, and although only 6 months old, his sutures appeared extremely wide...the front suture was about 1.5 inches apart. "What's going on" I asked the mother, through the translator. Mother tells me that her 6 month old son had been sick since Saturday, vomiting, diarrhea, fever, and his head was getting bigger acutely since Saturday. I called over to Jenna who was seeing a patient on the other side of the room...."I think this child has meningitis, and hydrocephalus, and I don't know what to do!" We both agreed to try and call a doctor at SLU or Cardinal Glennon and seek help, as we knew we were in over our heads. After many transfers, I was finally place on the line with Dr Warren. He walked me through the treatment of meningitis, the IV fluid boluses we needed to give the infant, and the way to administer the fluid if we couldn't get an IV line due to severe dehydration. I relayed this all to the nurse, aquired the anitbiotics to be administered, and cleaned a crib for the baby to stay in. The nurse took the supplies and I reluctantly went back to my other patients. About an hour later, between patients, I went to check on the baby. I had not heard anything from the nurses, so I assumed everything was going okay. Unfortunately, my assumption was completely incorrrect. I walked up to the nurses sitting around the infant, dumbfounded, trying to pour Pedialyte into his mouth. There was no IV in place, and the infant was no longer moving...he was completely floppy, being held by his mother, his eyes rolled back in his head. I looked at the nurses, shocked, scared, amazed. It was translated to me that they could not get an IV started due to his severe dehydration. I was angry that no one had come to tell me, but it was not an appropriate time for anger.
I yelled for Jenna to come and help me and rushed off to the storage room where I had seen an NG tube the day before. I searched for veins to start an IV, but to no avail. With Jenna talking me through it, I inserted the NG tube and quickly hooked it up to Lactated Ringers. Then I grabbed the antibiotics and administered them IM. After the infant was stable, I went back outside and called Dr Warren back. After describing Ishmael's breathing, his pinpoint pupils, and his obtunded state, Dr Warren said that it sounded like he was beginning the stages of brain herniation. I choked back tears, 'please...no...I can't let him die....' I was thinking, but trying to push back my emotion and listen carefully to Dr Warren's descriptions on how to intubate him, to hyperventilate him and vasoconstrict the vessels in his brain to decrease the pressure. He also explained how to insert an intra-osseous line into the baby's tibia to administer fluids, as the NG tube is suboptimal for absorbing the fluids in the way that this baby needed.
I got off the phone and the baby appeared as if he was improving slightly...he was crying! Oh how good that cry sounded to my ears! I got a 16 gauge needle and inserted it into the baby's tiny leg, feeling the bone crack beneath my needle and drawing back bone marrow. I was in!! My very first intra-osseous line, and I got it first time! We hooked it up to the IV fluids.
In the meantime, we were working on getting the infant transportation to an Emergency Room in town. Finally, 6 hours after the baby had arrived and we had put the car search in action, a vehile arrived. I jumped into the car, infant in my arms. Jenna sat in back and held the baby's IV fluids and IO line. And we rushed to town. The man who drove us, charged us $10 US, a ridiculous amount in this country to drive 20 minutes. And then he insisted on stopping along the way to talk to some friends because he was supposed to have a meeting!! He left us sitting in the car in the sun, I sat their sheilding his eyes from the sun and listening carefully for breath sounds to make sure he was still alive as he had become obtunded again. I could not believe our driver!! I wanted to yell and scream, but instead I fought back tears and prayed that this baby did not die in my arms. We stopped again once more to get gas before finally arriving at the hospital. I ran into the back entrance and told the gaurd to quickly get a doctor. Within seconds, a Cuban doctor came down the hallway and ushered us into a room. I quickly told him the baby's history and what has transpired throughout the day. Without hesitation he ushered us into a clean, white washed room with monitors!! And runnning water!! And hospital beds! I was amazed and shocked by the high standard of this ICU! Within 2 minutes the doctor and nurse had placed a central line and were pumping fluids into the infant. I exhaled...
I could breath for the first time that day. Finally, the baby was in good hands! I could not even express my gratitude to the Cuban doctors. Thank you for being in this country! Thank you for being here! Thank you thank you thank you!!
As I walked out of the hospital after exchanging numbers with the doctor and a promise that he would call with any news, I was blind sided by two arms around me in a huge embrace. I turned and looked...it was Ishmael's mother, arms wrapped around me. "Thank you..." she said in broken English. Then hugged Jenna and disappeared into the hospital. I was so happy, but still nervous.
Today I went back to the Cuban hospital. There was Ishmael, awake and crying in his bed! We did an ultrasound of his brain and the hydrocephalus was not at a level that the physician was worried. He said they would keep Ishmael in the hospital for 3 more days to administer IV antibiotics and fluids and then they would discharge him with close follow up to monitor the size of his head and ensure he is not building up fluid. I know he is in good hands now, and he will be okay. I think I felt, for the first time, the most terrifying feeling of almost having a baby die in my hands, with no higher authority to turn to, and the incredible bond I felt to Ishmael after feeling that I helped in saving his life. I will be forever changed by this experience.
The antagonism of two religious celebrations
Easter Sunday, an extremely important holiday in Haiti. For the Christians, the day that Christ was resurected from the tomb. For the Voodoo religion...well, I'm not sure...but cause for a celebration. Our day started slowly...we arose to the sound of a choir singing at sunrise and got dressed in our "Sunday best" (for Jenna and I that meant the cleanest t-shirt and skirt we could muster up) and headed across the dirt road to the mission's church. We arrived on time (something that Haitains never do) and were ushered to our seats at the very front of the church. The special white guests who had private chairs and would be called up and presented during church. Soon the local people began pouring in...children first. The girls sat on one side of the church, the boys on the other. I was shocked and amazed by their dress! All the little girls in elegant dresses with bows and frills, bright colors with fancy bows in their hair, small heels on their feet, and a little purse slung over every arm...even the girls as small as 3 or 4 years. And the boys...in suits, dress pants, and jackets! Dressed as though they were the best man in their brother's wedding. Sooo fancy! I felt quite sheepish in my dirty skirt, wrinkled shirt and sandals. Church was long. There were sermons, reading from the bible, and lots of singing (my favorite part!) We didn't understand most of it, as it was in Creole. We did, however have a translator who tried to yell the translation to us over the sermon, but it was more of an annoyance than helpful. There was also another American girl siting next to me who felt very choff as she is a regular church go-er in the US and brought her own bible. She took it upon herself to explain to me in slow, careful way as if I was a 3 year old that "today is important for us Christians, because this is the day that we believe Jesus Christ rose from the dead..." and on and on. I wanted to turn to her and say, "I wasn't born yesterday!" But instead I smiled begrudgingly at her and tried to ignore her words of infinite wisdom.
At the end of the sermons, Pastor Michel called the 4 of us whiteys up on stage and introced us to everyone in the mission. He explained the work that we are doing at the hospital and the work the other 2 are doing on micro-financing and teaching at the University. He called everyone up to the front of the hospital who would like to welcome us. It was quite an affectionate welcoming, men and women all came and formed a circle around us and welcomed us with prayer and hand holding and hellos. We felt humbled at their appreciation of us being their to help them. It felt good.
After that, we left and went into town where the "manager" of the hospital has built a church and is trying to start a congregation. We met some of his children and friends. Driving around town, we had quite an amusing experience....the "voodoo" people of the town were out celebrating easter in their own way...walking the streets with boom boxes, drums, and barrels of run and beer and stopping periodically to start a dance party and block the entire roadway. Jenna and I looked on excitedly, wishing we were with these people...they looked like they knew how to celebrate!! One of the missionaries from France was in the car with us...and she had a completely different idea of "these people". "Don't look them in the eye!" she shouted at Jenna and I..."This is Satan's work!" Jenna and I could barely hold back our laughter. As we attempted to drive through one of the crowds, the young voodoo group noticed her terror and began to antagonize her, banging on the window of the car. She put her hands over her head, closed her eyes, and began rocking back and forth singing prayers outloud!! It was such a hilarious situation! It was truly a battle to stiffle our amusement.
She was so scared that we had to turn around and come home, without visiting a resturant in town as planned. We were quite dissapointed to have missed the party in town and have to return to the boring compound with only some cold rice and beans for dinner.
At the end of the sermons, Pastor Michel called the 4 of us whiteys up on stage and introced us to everyone in the mission. He explained the work that we are doing at the hospital and the work the other 2 are doing on micro-financing and teaching at the University. He called everyone up to the front of the hospital who would like to welcome us. It was quite an affectionate welcoming, men and women all came and formed a circle around us and welcomed us with prayer and hand holding and hellos. We felt humbled at their appreciation of us being their to help them. It felt good.
After that, we left and went into town where the "manager" of the hospital has built a church and is trying to start a congregation. We met some of his children and friends. Driving around town, we had quite an amusing experience....the "voodoo" people of the town were out celebrating easter in their own way...walking the streets with boom boxes, drums, and barrels of run and beer and stopping periodically to start a dance party and block the entire roadway. Jenna and I looked on excitedly, wishing we were with these people...they looked like they knew how to celebrate!! One of the missionaries from France was in the car with us...and she had a completely different idea of "these people". "Don't look them in the eye!" she shouted at Jenna and I..."This is Satan's work!" Jenna and I could barely hold back our laughter. As we attempted to drive through one of the crowds, the young voodoo group noticed her terror and began to antagonize her, banging on the window of the car. She put her hands over her head, closed her eyes, and began rocking back and forth singing prayers outloud!! It was such a hilarious situation! It was truly a battle to stiffle our amusement.
She was so scared that we had to turn around and come home, without visiting a resturant in town as planned. We were quite dissapointed to have missed the party in town and have to return to the boring compound with only some cold rice and beans for dinner.
Saturday, April 3, 2010
Eben Ezer Hospital
The "hospital" was not at all what we expected, or what we were told. A once full-functioning in patient hospital with a sugery center, x-ray machine, EKG, and delivery room, is now a stone building covered in dust with the pediatric center being used as a tiny make-shift clinic and a small pharmacy with meager supplies. Luckily, when we arrived, there were 2 American doctors working in the clinic who were able to show us the ropes. It was their last morning in the clinic, they had been here for 10 days giving assistance. They gave us a quick overview of the needs... almost every woman has a yeast infection, and they do not do gynecological exams anywhere else in this country, so it was our responsibility to perform them on any woman complaining of dysuria, most of the children had worms, every person was anemic, dehydrated, and tachycardic, many of the women have no appetite, and this is most likely due to malnutritian and lack of vitamins...we should give them vitamins. And so on, and so forth. We saw patients with them in the morning...a small girl who had been in a car accident with a scalp laceration that we needed to stich up, a woman with really bad cervicitis, a young girl whom we discovered was pregnant, children with upper respiratory infections, etc. Then the doctors left us at noon and we were on our own!
Patients only really come to the clinic from 8am-2pm, and we have the afternoon "off", so we spent it exploring the compound and the hospital. We were given a tour of the once-functioning hospital and realized the potential of this place, if only it could get up and running again!! We were told that, after the hurricanes 2 years ago which wiped out much of Gonaives and destroyed part of the hospital, the government sent doctors to work at the hospital. However, there was corruption amongst these doctors and many of them just took the government wages and abandoned the hospital and all the suffering people. Since then, the hospital lost steam...the workers dissapated, the inpatient wards were abandoned, and everything was left, covered in dust. Just recently, they have hired a new Haitian doctor who lived in Port-au-Prince but was origingally from Gonaives. She came here after the earthquake to try and help her "people". Gonaives has essentially suffered twice over, first with the hurricanes...there is a massive lake just down the road from us, which once was a flourishing town. Now, next to the hospital there is a tent city for all the persons who lost their homes. The tents are poorly made and leave much to be desired in terms of a "home". And now, with the earthquake...although not damaged the way Port-au-Prince was, Gonaives has taken on the burden of all the displaced, hungry, sick, and injured. They estimate the city has accepted 35,000 people since the earthquake, and it is not a large city. Many families have adopted orphans or taken in relatives who have no home. Their income has not grown and neither has their land, and now they have many more mouths to feed. One of the directors at the hospital has himself taken in 9 orphans and is struggling to clothe, feed, and send to school his 9 new children as well as his own 4 daughters. The needs are great, we see malnourished children with obvious Kwashiokor everyday around the hospital. Their black hair turning orange, their belly's protruding, their stick thin legs and arms.... We even had a little boy yesterday in the clinic who was so malnurished that his legs and face were swelling due to lack of protein in his blood.
So during the tour of the hospital, we were shown a dark, dust-covered room they mentioned was the "supply room". Jenna and I began gingerly lifting the lids of the boxes, brushing aside clouds of dust, and came across a great discovery! There were boxes stacked ontop of boxes of untouched medical supplies! An entire room full, just waiting to be cleaned off and put to good use! How could all of these much-need supplies just be sitting here collecting dust?! They had EVERYTHING! From surgery kits, to medicaitons, more bandages and wound care supplies than you could imagine, daipers, suturing kits, urinary catheters, crutches, wheelchairs...everything you could think of that a fully functioning hospital could use! We found our new project...we would see patients in the morning and then in the afternoons we would attack this supplie room, dust everything off, and get things on shelves to start being used again. This would be our lasting contribution....the first steps in bringing back to life a much needed hospital in a struggling hospital.
We began tackling the project our second day here. We got a whole team together....8 in total! A french nurse working at the hospital, the Haitian doctor, a french missionary, and 3 Haitian women working in the hospital. We worked for hours, completely drenched in sweat, covered from head to foot in dirt, but at the end of the first day we had made quite a dent in the room! We had emptied most boxes and unloaded their treasures onto shelves, organizing a wound supply shelf, a suture shelf, and a surgery shelf. There is still soooo much to be done!! We have barely sratched the surface, but we left that day exhausted and proud of the work we had accomplished. If we continue as a team to tackle the work, it should not be long before the hospital supplies will be ready!!
Patients only really come to the clinic from 8am-2pm, and we have the afternoon "off", so we spent it exploring the compound and the hospital. We were given a tour of the once-functioning hospital and realized the potential of this place, if only it could get up and running again!! We were told that, after the hurricanes 2 years ago which wiped out much of Gonaives and destroyed part of the hospital, the government sent doctors to work at the hospital. However, there was corruption amongst these doctors and many of them just took the government wages and abandoned the hospital and all the suffering people. Since then, the hospital lost steam...the workers dissapated, the inpatient wards were abandoned, and everything was left, covered in dust. Just recently, they have hired a new Haitian doctor who lived in Port-au-Prince but was origingally from Gonaives. She came here after the earthquake to try and help her "people". Gonaives has essentially suffered twice over, first with the hurricanes...there is a massive lake just down the road from us, which once was a flourishing town. Now, next to the hospital there is a tent city for all the persons who lost their homes. The tents are poorly made and leave much to be desired in terms of a "home". And now, with the earthquake...although not damaged the way Port-au-Prince was, Gonaives has taken on the burden of all the displaced, hungry, sick, and injured. They estimate the city has accepted 35,000 people since the earthquake, and it is not a large city. Many families have adopted orphans or taken in relatives who have no home. Their income has not grown and neither has their land, and now they have many more mouths to feed. One of the directors at the hospital has himself taken in 9 orphans and is struggling to clothe, feed, and send to school his 9 new children as well as his own 4 daughters. The needs are great, we see malnourished children with obvious Kwashiokor everyday around the hospital. Their black hair turning orange, their belly's protruding, their stick thin legs and arms.... We even had a little boy yesterday in the clinic who was so malnurished that his legs and face were swelling due to lack of protein in his blood.
So during the tour of the hospital, we were shown a dark, dust-covered room they mentioned was the "supply room". Jenna and I began gingerly lifting the lids of the boxes, brushing aside clouds of dust, and came across a great discovery! There were boxes stacked ontop of boxes of untouched medical supplies! An entire room full, just waiting to be cleaned off and put to good use! How could all of these much-need supplies just be sitting here collecting dust?! They had EVERYTHING! From surgery kits, to medicaitons, more bandages and wound care supplies than you could imagine, daipers, suturing kits, urinary catheters, crutches, wheelchairs...everything you could think of that a fully functioning hospital could use! We found our new project...we would see patients in the morning and then in the afternoons we would attack this supplie room, dust everything off, and get things on shelves to start being used again. This would be our lasting contribution....the first steps in bringing back to life a much needed hospital in a struggling hospital.
We began tackling the project our second day here. We got a whole team together....8 in total! A french nurse working at the hospital, the Haitian doctor, a french missionary, and 3 Haitian women working in the hospital. We worked for hours, completely drenched in sweat, covered from head to foot in dirt, but at the end of the first day we had made quite a dent in the room! We had emptied most boxes and unloaded their treasures onto shelves, organizing a wound supply shelf, a suture shelf, and a surgery shelf. There is still soooo much to be done!! We have barely sratched the surface, but we left that day exhausted and proud of the work we had accomplished. If we continue as a team to tackle the work, it should not be long before the hospital supplies will be ready!!
Arrival in Haiti
As our tiny plane rounded the corner of the island of Haiti, I gazed in excitement at the land below. I was shocked by the vast, green lands, the tropical jungle canopy over everything. I suppose I assumed that it would be more akin to parts of Africa I have seen, dry and barren.
We landed and unloaded from the plane and were greated by pastors and the "airport staff", which consisted of one large white woman and 4 Haitians who followed her around and obeyed the orders she barked at them. After going through "customs", which consisted of showing our passports, we were given our bags back and told to wait in a stiffling hot room until our ride came to pick us up. We met various other "blancs" (Creole for white person) in the room, who spoke english and chated with us about their various mission work. One lady was very kind, she held my hand and dragged me outdoors to exchange some American dollars into Haitian "goud" so that we could buy a soda. She had been living in Haiti for the past 23 years, had married a Haitian man, and seemed to know everyone around us! After a couple ours of waiting, she grew worried about us and gave us her mobile number to call if we were indeed abandoned in the Cap Haitian airport. Luckily, after about 2 hours the large white woman came inside and told us that the truck that our hospital had sent for us had broken down and they were trying to find another ride for us. Finally, after 4 hours of sitting in the humid little airport room, a man arrived asking for "sawah". We were relieved and excited...finally! There were boxes of medical supplies at the airport for our hospital, and I had to pay $100 to have them be cut open and examined by the "customs crew". Finally, we loaded our supplies into the truck, hopped aboard, and started our journey to Gonaives. We were told it was a 3 hour drive....it took us almost 6. But the drive, although long, was fantastic! We drove up into the mountians of Haiti, watching small villages pass us by, observing the people go about their lives. Every so often we would be spotted by a small child who would yell "blanc" and then all the children, and some adults would come out to the road and wave at us, occasionally reaching out hands asking for money. We arrived at our compound after dark and were shown our room in Claire Chappuis' house. The room is simple, but nice. We each have a metal bunk bed to ourselves, which we use the bottom for sleeping and the top as a shelf for our clothes. We have a ceiling fan that works from 2pm-10pm, and 2 small windows in one corner. We also have a simple wooden table by the door and a makeshift wooden board at the other coner, which we have arranged our toiletries on. Simple, but very livable :)
Jenna and I were exhausted and went straight to bed in eager anticipation of starting our first day at the hospital the next morning!!
We landed and unloaded from the plane and were greated by pastors and the "airport staff", which consisted of one large white woman and 4 Haitians who followed her around and obeyed the orders she barked at them. After going through "customs", which consisted of showing our passports, we were given our bags back and told to wait in a stiffling hot room until our ride came to pick us up. We met various other "blancs" (Creole for white person) in the room, who spoke english and chated with us about their various mission work. One lady was very kind, she held my hand and dragged me outdoors to exchange some American dollars into Haitian "goud" so that we could buy a soda. She had been living in Haiti for the past 23 years, had married a Haitian man, and seemed to know everyone around us! After a couple ours of waiting, she grew worried about us and gave us her mobile number to call if we were indeed abandoned in the Cap Haitian airport. Luckily, after about 2 hours the large white woman came inside and told us that the truck that our hospital had sent for us had broken down and they were trying to find another ride for us. Finally, after 4 hours of sitting in the humid little airport room, a man arrived asking for "sawah". We were relieved and excited...finally! There were boxes of medical supplies at the airport for our hospital, and I had to pay $100 to have them be cut open and examined by the "customs crew". Finally, we loaded our supplies into the truck, hopped aboard, and started our journey to Gonaives. We were told it was a 3 hour drive....it took us almost 6. But the drive, although long, was fantastic! We drove up into the mountians of Haiti, watching small villages pass us by, observing the people go about their lives. Every so often we would be spotted by a small child who would yell "blanc" and then all the children, and some adults would come out to the road and wave at us, occasionally reaching out hands asking for money. We arrived at our compound after dark and were shown our room in Claire Chappuis' house. The room is simple, but nice. We each have a metal bunk bed to ourselves, which we use the bottom for sleeping and the top as a shelf for our clothes. We have a ceiling fan that works from 2pm-10pm, and 2 small windows in one corner. We also have a simple wooden table by the door and a makeshift wooden board at the other coner, which we have arranged our toiletries on. Simple, but very livable :)
Jenna and I were exhausted and went straight to bed in eager anticipation of starting our first day at the hospital the next morning!!
The trip to Haiti begins!
Our adventure did not exactly start out easily... After a crazy fun filled weekend in vegas for my little sister's bachelorette party, I arrived home at 11pm sunday night exhausted and sunburnt, lacking the strength to do anything but crash. Which left me waking up monday morning with half a day to pack for a 1 month trip to work in a hospital in the poorest country in the world! What would I need? What essential supplies do you pack when you're going somewhere with no running water and only a few hours if electricity a day and your trying to treat sick and starving people? As you can imagine, I've forgotten many things! So... Jenna (my travelmate, classmate, aswell as one of my closest friends) and I managed to get everything together and arrive in time for our flight to Orlando, Florida. From there we rented a car and drove down to vero beach, then dropped of the rental and caught a cab to fort pierce, fl where we had rented a hotel room for the night. I thought I would try and save us some money by booking the cheapest hotel, but I'm not so sure that was the best idea...the room was a hole in the wall, reeked of smoke, sheets stained with all sorts of stuff, and a rusted fridge. But we only had 4 hours to lie down until our flight in the morning, so we made do! We woke up at 5am the next morning and called a cab to take us to the tiny airport down the street. There was confusion about our booking and for a moment we worried we would not even make it to Haiti! But then the group of pilots seemed to have figured it out... "ohhh, you're flying with him!" They said and pointed to their friend, laughing. Jenna and I didn'tunderstand what was so funny until they walked us past all the small 12 person planes and pointed to our plane. It was a tiny 4 person plane, hardley bigger than the taxi mini van we had ridden in the night before! We gingerly climbed abroad and buckeld into out tiny seats, one at each window and introduced ourselves to our 25 yr old pilot, who did not look a day over 18 years old!
But the flight was quite an adventure. We watched a beautiful sunrise over the ocean, spotted oil rigs seemingly abdandoned in the middle of nowhere, and watched as the land came clearly into view. We stopped half way for fuel in a tiny island in Barbados, grabbed a quick breakfast and hopped back on the plane...we were on our way to Haiti!!
But the flight was quite an adventure. We watched a beautiful sunrise over the ocean, spotted oil rigs seemingly abdandoned in the middle of nowhere, and watched as the land came clearly into view. We stopped half way for fuel in a tiny island in Barbados, grabbed a quick breakfast and hopped back on the plane...we were on our way to Haiti!!
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