Couldn't believe the difference.

Not a week goes by without a story about how important Visitation Clinic is to our people.  Here is what happened last Friday.  The day was busy and long.  Our volunteers from Indiana were invaluable in getting 63 patients treated and everyone was packing to return to Port-au-Prince.  Then, an emergency.  A nearby traffic accident leaves a woman with a severally injured foot.  It is beyond what we can treat, so our new vehicle becomes an ambulance and Dr. JF and our visitors drive her to the department's only hospital.  Then the ordeal begins.  They have no pain meds, so we provide them.  The x-ray tech has left and doesn't want to come back in, until Dr. JF makes numerous phone calls.  It is late that night before our patient is stabilized and a reluctant agreement is made to use the government ambulance to take her to Port-au-Prince.  Our visitors couldn't believe the difference between the caring and compassion they had seen all week at Visitation Clinic, and what they saw at the hospital. 

Our guests returned home yesterday with numerous stories about the teamwork and competence they had observed at our clinic.  They saw first hand how badly it is needed and how important it is to support it.  Each one had taken valuable leave from their work, bought their own plane tickets and even reimbursed us for our room, board and transportation costs.  They told me that they can't wait to return.

Floors

We received a perceptive comment from a volunteer who is planning her first trip to the clinic.  She looked at the photos in our Vaccination blog, and noticed how neat the mothers were and how clean our floors were.  The first observation is not unusual for visitors.  They often marvel how a woman can walk several miles down a muddy road, in the rain, carrying a baby and even a basket on her head, and look like she stepped out of a limosine.  We don't know they do it.  All we know is that the clinic is important to them, and they don't want to come looking anything less than their best. 

On the other hand, we do know how our floors stay clean.  It is because our cleaning staff work hard to keep them that way.  You may have noticed that our floors are white tile.  "Why white?", you might ask, "Won't it show all the dirt?"  Yes it does and that is why we want it.  Dirt can't hide on a white floor.  Is this the norm for all of Haiti?  Well, here is photo of a nearby hospital floor. 

You can help bring clean, competent and compassionate healthcare to poor people who appreciate it.  Just click here.

Vaccination Day

On Tuesdays and Thursdays the clinic provides free vaccinations for children.  This week our volunteers from Indiana lent their hand. 

Programs like this are making a considerable impact on the overall health in the region served by the clinic.  It is only through the contributions of our many donors that efforts like this are sustained.

Medical Volunteers at Clinic

One of the many ways that volunteers contribute is by bringing their talents and training directly to our patients. This week we have a doctor and three nurses who have travelled to Haiti for the first time and are assisting our Haitian staff in treating patients. By days end, 49 patients had been seen at the clinic. 

We've got wheels!

Happy Day: After series of events that would seem impossible anywhere but Haiti, we now have our new Ford Everest STW. It is in our possession, with an insurance sticker and some form of license plate (which may be cardboard - there are no metal plates left in Haiti).

Here is a photo of "le machine".

Incidentally, one of the impossible events preceding today was the handsome donation from a most generous donor that paid most of the costs. Our gratitude is immense. The gratitude of our staff in Haiti is even greater. They are the ones who have been riding "tap-taps" to Miragoane, and then climbing on the back of motorcycles to ride the last ten miles down the dirt (usually muddy) road.