Haiti- Days 11 and 12

I’ve gotten to know two nuns who are caring for a patient of mine at an orphanage in Port of Prince. Every 4 days they drive the 2 hours in traffic each way. On Monday they told me of the trouble a sister convent of theirs was having with earthquake victim’s wounds. We exchanged information and Silvio and I said that we would try to help. We contemplated driving and as we were making are final plans we were informed that a volunteer had shown up and donated his helicopter and his pilot for our use. 20 minutes later we were in the air. We flew over Port of Prince and refueled at it’s airport.

Words can’t describe the devastation that we saw in and around the neighboring area. It seemed like 2 out of every 3 houses were leveled. Seas of tents were seen with messages of SOS and NEED FOOD from the air. We were speechless. I walked on the ruble at Ground Zero on that Sept 12th, and this reminded of that same feeling of helplessness.

We traveled about 100 miles south of there to the city of Les Cayes, we found the convent of The Missionaries of Charity, this is the order that Mother Theresa was part of. Seven nuns run the place with over 200 children in their care. The place was spotless in the middle of an incredibly poor city that has grown with 12,000 homeless since the quake. We rounded on all their patients and educated them about some aspects of wound care, but they were doing an amazing job anyway considering their resources and staffing. Then they took us through the city to meet an 11 year old girl who caught fire while cooking during a tremor last week. She’s burnt over 30% of her body and beyond the treatment capabilities at that hospital. We made arrangements with the nuns to transfer her and her father to our facility on Saturday. We spent the night in a tent inside the convent grounds and flew back today.

Tomorrow morning we’re back in the OR doing cases and rounding in the afternoon. Two more Plastic Surgeons from Manhattan get here tomorrow night. I feel as though everything that I needed to get in place here before I left is now done. Tomorrow I’ll book my flight home for Friday, where I can continue to organize and arrange from afar.

Goodnight from Haiti.