6 Aug
Hope Everywhere
The lead-up to this trip has been rough. Haiti has been experiencing escalating conflict for many months, and the decision to proceed with our trip was constantly in question. Many members of our team decided to stay home out of legitimate concerns for safety. Flights were delayed. Bull was hacking up a lung…then Crystal, then Betty. We lost a bag of supplies at the airport that held medications without which surgery is impossible (we later retrieved it). The bank account got hacked the day before we left (resolved, but time consuming). But then our team landed in Haiti and we found what we always find: an incredible group of Haitian healthcare workers at Hôpital Bernard Mevs, a group that works tirelessly and skillfully to serve the severely injured in their community. A patient population that is strong and resilient and grateful and badly in need of care. An ability to adjust, overcome and carry on in a challenging healthcare setting. A familiar cat, that stays in the volunteer quarters and can’t get enough of our soft gauze in enormous plastic bags. By the end of today, our team, with several brilliant, Haitian, surgical residents, will complete 20 surgeries. We will treat 25-year-old Joseph, who has been living with a badly infected knee for over a year. Joseph was a driven agricultural engineering student, but could not continue to study with the pain in his knee. He can’t wait to get back to classes. We operated on Jasmin’s femur, which was fractured in a car accident ten days ago. Until he heals, he’ll continue to worry about losing the masonry income he feeds his siblings with. It’s an intense time to be in Haiti. Last Sunday was the 10-year anniversary of the earthquake that killed an estimated 200-300,000 people. A few of us were lucky enough to visit the memorial of the earthquake, located at the sight of a mass grave where victims are buried. Nearly every person in this country mourns at least one loved one. An entire generation of nurses was lost when the nursing school collapsed. In less than 30 seconds, a country was transformed. Many say it will never recover. But at 4:53 PM on Sunday, our team put down their scalpels and their drills and took a moment of silence to hold the earthquake victims, their families and all Haitians in our thoughts. And then we looked up to the sky to see a rainbow stretched wide and bright across the sky. There is hope everywhere here.
READ MORE
14 Jun
Day 5 in Haiti
The NAVMC team landed in Port-au-Prince 5 days ago, and it has been non-stop since. From day one, this trip has been different. In recent weeks, President Jovenal Moïse has been implicated in two government audits on the misuse of billions of dollars in Venezuelan aid meant to help the country’s poor. Thousands of Haitians have been marching in the streets, calling for his resignation. On our short drive from the airport to Hopital Bernard Mevs, streets were largely abandoned, but burned cars, still-smoking tires and the remnants of roadblocks evidenced the civil unrest Haiti is enmeshed in. Our team is moving forward as usual. We ran a clinic the day after we arrived to find patients that our orthopedic surgeons can help, and the need here is overwhelming. Hopital Bernard Mevs is staffed with dedicated, highly-skilled medical professionals, but violence is making it too dangerous for many to travel to and from the hospital. There are staff that haven’t been home in days, and our team is happy to be able to provide some respite. We are also missing the Haitian surgical residents that have been an integral part of our trips in the past, who are unable to travel safely to Bernard Mevs. We are starting our third long day of back-to back surgeries, and the conflict is posing some logistical challenges. It’s difficult to get water, for example, so we can only clean surgical tools once a day. But the amount we have been able to accomplish so far is remarkable: 13 surgeries in two days. On day two we treated a woman who had been caught in the crossfire at a protest and had a gunshot wound in her shoulder. Yesterday, Dr. Martin and his team labored through a 4-hour surgery to put rods in the shattered femur and tibia/fibula of a motor vehicle accident victim. Our team is perfectly safe in the hospital, but we spend a lot of time caring for and thinking about the people outside of the hospital walls, where the dangers posed by the political unrest are nearly impossible to avoid. Thank you for your support. Molly Brown, Executive Director
READ MORE
29 Dec
December 2018 – Trip Summary
Molhenne was supposed to die. When our medical team left Haiti in December 2017, her blood count was insufficient to sustain life especially in someone who had just lost both of her legs. She has been HIV positive since birth and medications had kept the virus at bay. At 17 years old she presented to us at a hospital in Haiti with feet that had suddenly become mummified. We still do not know the reason. The day she arrived at the hospital, our entire team of 15 huddled in the operating room till late at night as two of our surgeons performed the first of what would be three surgeries on her that week. In the last, we removed both of her legs through the knee joints. We had little hope for her as we were leaving. She like many is the victim of an inadequate healthcare system where the vast majority lack access to any real medical treatment. Last week Molhenne came to visit us, a new team of 18 volunteers at Bernard Mevs Hospital in Port-au-Prince. This amazing young lady is lovely, vibrant, strong and full of life and appreciation. Everyone at the hospital remembered her and tears flowed freely. She is getting back in school and is currently being fitted with prostheses for her amputated legs; funded by a donor recruited by NAVMC. Somehow, she was not supposed to die thanks in large part to the work of our team of volunteers. On December 1st, a team of 16 medical volunteers travelled to Haiti for our 33rd trip since the earthquake struck this impoverished country almost 9 years ago. We were able to operate on 25 people most of whom waited for us for weeks to months. Our team worked with and taught Haitian physicians in training from the two state hospitals in Port-au-Prince. These facilities are filled with orthopedic patients who cannot afford any medical supplies or equipment. Last June one of them begged us not to discard the week-old bandage we removed from his open right lower leg fracture as he could not afford a new one. We were able to help him during that visit and he came back to us last week walking on a healed limb. There is a great sense of satisfaction in helping these patients but even more so when watching the local orthopedic residents in training perform the surgeries under our tutelage. Yonel is a 28-year-old male who suffered an open femur fracture in a car accident several weeks prior to our arrival. He had no money to pay for any supplies. He lay in bed in traction provided by a coke bottle filled with dirty water hanging over the end of his bed and attached by a string to his left leg. Soon after surgery performed by the by the Haitian residents, assisted and funded by our team, Yonel was able to get out of bed and return home. Rose underwent removal of a massive tumor from her right arm in July 2018. Her surgery was orchestrated, funded and performed by our team in conjunction with two surgeons from Loma Linda, California. She returned to see us last week with a functioning hand which she uses for all activities. She is hoping to return to school and hopes one day to be a nurse. Woodjina is a 7 year old girl whom we have been treating for 2 years for severe infections in the bones of both of her legs. She is doing well following 4 surgeries to rid her of some remaining infection. She was dying when we first met her in December 2016. At the end of the trip the Haitian residents came to us excited and appreciative for the opportunity to perform surgeries on their patients, those they had been following for weeks unable to treat lack of resources. Many other patients left behind will continue waiting for another team and most will never have their broken limbs repaired. Our electrical team was at Renmen Orphanage in Port-au-Prince at the same time. Home to 50 children, we have provided for their education for the last 6 years. The team continued one of our ongoing projects, rewiring the entire orphanage. Prior to this visit, kids would get shocked just touching the walls of their dorm and others were probing with sticks exposed wires in open outlet boxes. The electrical team was able to finish the rewiring of the remaining dorms and also were able to help set up a new water pump to provide water for the kids. The needs here are many. The highlight of this visit to the orphanage however is spending time with the kids. The small children thirst for any attention and the older ones are anxious to share what they are doing in school and what they want to do as a profession. Through our efforts, five girls have graduated from college in Haiti including three from nursing school one from laboratory technology and one from a hotel and restaurant program. By May of 2019, two more will have graduated from Northern Arizona University with degrees in Hotel Restaurant Management and Social Work. We are currently sending eleven kids to post-secondary education: one to medical school, two to nursing school, one to law school, and 7 others are in university pursuing other degrees. When I first came to Renmen eight years ago these kids had little hope of an education beyond elementary school. None could tell you what they would do as adults. Now they all know. Our trip ended with a visit from Santa Claus. Each child received a personalized backpack filled with gifts, their name embroidered on the front. Thanks to you, we can continue this work in Haiti, Bolivia and here at home. Happy Holidays Bull Durham
READ MORE
25 Dec
Happy Holidays from Haiti
NAVMC has just returned from its 3rd trip to Haiti this year. Attached is a trip summary. We wanted to share with you our successes from Haiti understanding that this is only one part of the work that we are doing locally and globally. If you have already given to help support this work, we thank you. If you have not yet given and would like to or if you would like to send a years end gift, you can do so via Paypal by clicking the link below or by going to our website: www.navmc.org. Yesterday Ertha graduated from Mission Bon Samaritan, a college in Port-au-Prince with a degree in Laboratory Sciences. Her school has been supported by NAVMC and now she will likely easily find work in one of the hospitals in Haiti. An opportunity few have in this impoverished country. Ertha is one of 6 girls from Renmen orphanage in Haiti that have graduated from University through funding provided by NAVMC and your kind donations. We currently are sending 60 kids from Renmen to school in Haiti including 10 in University. Molhenne at 17 has a new life following emergency surgeries performed by our team in December 2017 in which she lost both of her legs. She is being fitted for prosthetic legs and quite likely will be walking when we see her at our next visit. We are currently securing funds from a donor to pay for these devices which she otherwise could not afford. These projects as well as so many others would not be possible without your help. Thank you so much for your support. Because of you, hundreds of Haitian people have been given the opportunity to survive and thrive against all odds. Happy Holidays to you and yours. John “Bull” Durham President: Northern Arizona Volunteer Medical Corp
READ MORE
11 Jul
Coming Home
There are 10 of us crammed into the “ambulance” as we speed through Port-au-Prince this morning dodging the fires that still burn in the streets. We are one of the few vehicles on what are normally jam-packed roads in the city. AMBULANCE is written on the side of the van which gets us through several street blockages. Coconut trees, power lines, scorched trucks, shattered street signs and burning tires block many of the boulevards. The store fronts and banks have shattered windows and dented siding from the rocks that are strewn across the roadways in front of them. A solemn reminder of the events yesterday. The air is filled with smoke. There is the occasional but too frequent sound of a gun going off. Ahead there is a huge fire in the middle of our route and people are running wildly. Michel our chauffer reels the ambulance backwards and finds another way. The hardest thing for me to see were the faces of the people. They are angry and tired of the burden of life in Haiti compounded by the proposition of increased diesel expenses that will make it impossible for some to purchase this commodity that is critical to their lives. The increased fuel prices have been rescinded but the burden of living in Haiti remains. This is the darker side of a country in turmoil and distress. Fortunately, this is a rare occurrence. One I have not experienced in my nine years of visits to Haiti. At no time did I feel unsafe. The people know why we are here and offer us their embrace and friendship. On the other side of the unrest is the beauty and resilience of a 15 year old who is sitting up in her hospital bed smiling, taking only Ibuprofen for pain the day after her thigh bone was reassembled in a 2 hour surgery. The power and the love of the family who is supporting a woman who is recovering from an eight hour surgery to rebuild her arm. Laughing with them the night after the surgery she pauses and talks about her dreams of becoming a nurse. While in Haiti, Ange called me to thank me and to let me know she had passed her nursing exam. Our first to graduate from nursing school, she is now working at the only cancer treatment program in Port-au-Prince. Kerline is our second to graduate (July 1st). More to come. I believe we rebuild one brick at a time. With each trip to Haiti our team touches a few, teaches a few, collaborates with a few and eventually our world gets smaller while our bubble of influence and love gets larger. We are making a huge difference on so many levels. Glad to be on my way home. Love Bull
READ MORE
9 Jul
Day 3 in Haiti
Today has been a day of rest and unrest. We are safe in the compound around Adventiste Hospital resting after a long and stressful day yesterday. The streets of Port-au-Prince are filled with burning tires and the air is black over the city. In the distance we can hear occasional gunfire and protesters screaming. A fuel price hike has sent some of the people to the streets in protest. Internet is spotty and we are not getting much information. All flights out of Port-au-Prince were cancelled today as the violence shut down the airport. There has been no threat to us and I don’t expect any. Our patients are recovering well and thankful for what we have done for them. Today they begin their return to their normal lives. Rose was very anxious to see pictures of the tumor we removed from her arm. She is glad to be rid of it having carried it around for two and a half years. Love Daly is in some pain after her surgery but grateful nonetheless for her new leg. I am thank-full it is over and ready to return home. Tomorrow I am hopeful we can get to the airport and head home. Thanks again for your support. Love from Haiti. Dr Bull
READ MORE