hope for haiti.

Monday was my worst day in Haiti. The only one I’ve really hated actually. I don’t know if it’s the chaos of orienting new people every Monday or the fact that everyone gets sick or injured on Mondays. And Brooke left me for several hours (it’s okay I still love you).

Somehow the day managed to end. This week has been a very different feel as the Ortho surgeon is a Pediatric specialist, and with few Peds surgical cases we are only doing about one case a day.

Kevelyn was transferred back to us (we transferred her to Miami’s hospital for a general surgeon and they sent her back…also contributing to my Monday). She was in a car accident last week with bilateral femur fractures. We discovered yesterday she also has an ankle fracture. That’s what happens when we try to conserve xrays I guess.

Pray for her. She has a long road ahead of her. She’s already fighting infection as Miami did not give her any antibiotics for three days, and she still really could use a transfusion. But there is no blood in Port-au-Prince. (Although I saw one private pay patient being infused yesterday….amazing how that happens).

Everyone seems to be counting down the days for Dr Scott to return for his brief stay. I think we’re all hoping his medical knowledge and male leadership will help to organize things again.

I finally got a list of all the labs we are capable of doing. Now if I could just memorize the medications we have….which is impossible because they change with each incoming team.

Some things will never get easier, but many are.

I had to put my foot down for the first time yesterday regarding a patient’s discharge. There were about six ex-pats arguing whether or not he should depart. I think some of them are still mad at me. But someone’s got to make decisions.

Jeanty, a Haitian translator/OR tech/transporter/caregiver/amazing person keeps a running list of patients without family members. The number keeps growing. If you are in the hospital in Haiti without family no one feeds you, bathes you, or helps you get to the bathroom. It’s an ongoing struggle. The hospital provides one meal a day. But you’re SOL without family for the others. Many of us chip in so that Jeanty can buy them food, but this is something we’ve got to figure out.

We have a sickle cell patient in the ER right now with a hemoglobin of 2.7 and no way of getting any blood. I asked Brooke what they did back in February…it’s not like the “no blood” situation has gotten worse over time. She simply said that the patient’s died. “You do everything you can and then you pray,” Dr Gray said today. That’s the way of life here.

I struggle with whether I’m supposed to accept it or not. It’s not okay that the #1 hospital in the country doing orthopedic surgeries has no access to blood... especially when billions of dollars were donated to the Red Cross. But what can you do? You can’t stay angry because you wouldn’t get anything done.

So you just keep working and hoping. Hoping that the “hope for Haiti” everyone talked about is still out there somewhere.