Leaving all the comforts of home behind, three local nurses recently heeded a call for assistance in earthquake-ravaged Haiti, the poorest country in the Americas.
“They are in wretched straits and they desperately need our help,” said St. Patrick Hospital’s Melanie Gentry, RN, MSN CNOR.
Gentry, along with fellow CHRISTUS St. Patrick Operating Room nurses Karen Carr, RN, CNOR, and Molly Hagen, RNFA, CNOR, relayed the tale of their eight day mission to provide medical care to hundreds in Port-au-Prince, Haiti’s capital and largest city, to the Sulphur Kiwanis Club on Wednesday afternoon.
From February 19 to February 27, the three nurses were part of a 20 member CHRISTUS Health System team, which included four other nurses, two spiritual advisors, four anesthesiologists, and seven doctors drawn from various CHRISTUS hospitals in Louisiana, Texas, and New Mexico. One doctor, a surgeon, led the group. That doctor was Dr. Thomas Royer, President and CEO of the CHRISTUS Health System.
“I cannot tell you how much respect I have for this man,” said Gentry about Dr. Royer. “He is not just a suit.”
The group worked in partnership with the University of Miami Miller School of Medicine. They left with 3,000 lbs of medical and personal supplies on a chartered 737 arranged by U.S. Representative Rodney Alexander of Louisiana, and arrived in the capital city to live and work out of circus size tents, with outdoor showering facilities, Port-a-Potties, and no running water.
“It was amazing the things we had and the things we didn’t have,” said Gentry.
The group had things like advanced anesthesia equipment and a pharmacy filled with medications, but, according to Gentry, film for a chest x-ray took all day. There were no operating room spotlights, so nurses held flashlights on the wound during operations. And with no running water, baby wipes and hand sanitizers were very important, not only for personal grooming but for operation preparation. And then there were the flies; they constantly swarmed near open wounds on patients.
“Flies were a big problem,” said Gentry as she presented photos of the operating room with flyswatters and fly paper hanging next to patients being operated on.
But the group did meet extraordinary people.
“They are people [who] have nothing, expect nothing, and are grateful for what they receive,” said Gentry of the Haitians.
Of their patients, there were none with only a single wound. Everyone suffered from multiple wounds. And every one of the medical team, according to Hagen, seemed to have had a meltdown at one time or another. Hagen’s meltdown came after the death of a five-month-old baby she was caring for. Carr’s was during an instance of apparent escalating violence between the family of one of her patients and the camp’s guards. The guards believed the family had stolen the blankets that Carr had given them. And not speaking the Creole French of the Haitians, she could not communicate to the guards otherwise. Carr’s emotional breakdown was what ended the drama.
Joy came in the form of the many babies born while they were there. The birth of a baby would bring everyone in the camp around.
And the nurses all agreed that they left feeling like there was so much more to do, especially in light of the continued suffering of the Haitian people as they try to recover. Gentry pointed out that Haiti is currently in the rainy season, with monsoon-type weather, and soon they will move into hurricane season.
“It’s an astronomical problem,” she said.
And on the care side, the shortage of nurses is a big problem as well. Gentry stated that the doctor to nurse ratio was four to one. Often, there would be less than half a dozen nurses responsible for the care of up to 120 patients.
But the nurses were grateful for the experience, helping them appreciate their lives here that much more.
“We gained more than we gave,” said Carr of the experience.
For more information about the medical mission, visit Dr. Royer’s blogsite at www.wiresidechatwithdrtom.blogspot.com.
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Leaving all the comforts of home behind, three local nurses recently heeded a call for assistance in earthquake-ravaged Haiti, the poorest country in the Americas.
“They are in wretched straits and they desperately need our help,” said St. Patrick Hospital’s Melanie Gentry, RN, MSN CNOR.
Gentry, along with fellow CHRISTUS St. Patrick Operating Room nurses Karen Carr, RN, CNOR, and Molly Hagen, RNFA, CNOR, relayed the tale of their eight day mission to provide medical care to hundreds in Port-au-Prince, Haiti’s capital and largest city, to the Sulphur Kiwanis Club on Wednesday afternoon.
From February 19 to February 27, the three nurses were part of a 20 member CHRISTUS Health System team, which included four other nurses, two spiritual advisors, four anesthesiologists, and seven doctors drawn from various CHRISTUS hospitals in Louisiana, Texas, and New Mexico. One doctor, a surgeon, led the group. That doctor was Dr. Thomas Royer, President and CEO of the CHRISTUS Health System.
“I cannot tell you how much respect I have for this man,” said Gentry about Dr. Royer. “He is not just a suit.”
The group worked in partnership with the University of Miami Miller School of Medicine. They left with 3,000 lbs of medical and personal supplies on a chartered 737 arranged by U.S. Representative Rodney Alexander of Louisiana, and arrived in the capital city to live and work out of circus size tents, with outdoor showering facilities, Port-a-Potties, and no running water.
“It was amazing the things we had and the things we didn’t have,” said Gentry.
The group had things like advanced anesthesia equipment and a pharmacy filled with medications, but, according to Gentry, film for a chest x-ray took all day. There were no operating room spotlights, so nurses held flashlights on the wound during operations. And with no running water, baby wipes and hand sanitizers were very important, not only for personal grooming but for operation preparation. And then there were the flies; they constantly swarmed near open wounds on patients.
“Flies were a big problem,” said Gentry as she presented photos of the operating room with flyswatters and fly paper hanging next to patients being operated on.
But the group did meet extraordinary people.
“They are people [who] have nothing, expect nothing, and are grateful for what they receive,” said Gentry of the Haitians.
Of their patients, there were none with only a single wound. Everyone suffered from multiple wounds. And every one of the medical team, according to Hagen, seemed to have had a meltdown at one time or another. Hagen’s meltdown came after the death of a five-month-old baby she was caring for. Carr’s was during an instance of apparent escalating violence between the family of one of her patients and the camp’s guards. The guards believed the family had stolen the blankets that Carr had given them. And not speaking the Creole French of the Haitians, she could not communicate to the guards otherwise. Carr’s emotional breakdown was what ended the drama.
Joy came in the form of the many babies born while they were there. The birth of a baby would bring everyone in the camp around.
And the nurses all agreed that they left feeling like there was so much more to do, especially in light of the continued suffering of the Haitian people as they try to recover. Gentry pointed out that Haiti is currently in the rainy season, with monsoon-type weather, and soon they will move into hurricane season.
“It’s an astronomical problem,” she said.
And on the care side, the shortage of nurses is a big problem as well. Gentry stated that the doctor to nurse ratio was four to one. Often, there would be less than half a dozen nurses responsible for the care of up to 120 patients.
But the nurses were grateful for the experience, helping them appreciate their lives here that much more.
“We gained more than we gave,” said Carr of the experience.
For more information about the medical mission, visit Dr. Royer’s blogsite at www.wiresidechatwithdrtom.blogspot.com.
