Good morning from Haiti! Thank you to everyone who donated to the fundraiser last month. The response was impressive! We used some of these funds for a small program to help local farmers replant their gardens. I used our local clinic advisory committee to find 40 people. We gave them vouchers for fertilizer and spray as these are their biggest expenses. The committee was able to quickly find people. They said those they were able to help were very thankful. One morning walking to the clinic I had a man come up to me and shake my hand and say thank you. I have also provided some funds to help others. We can’t help everyone, but those we were able to help say thank you and I want to pass that on. This brought some hope to the community that not all is lost. Pray that these gardens can bring a good harvest and that the roads can be open to bring it to market.
Several weeks ago a man brought a screaming 4 year old girl to our house. She had second degree burns to her chest and stomach. I took them down to the clinic by moto. It really wasn’t a severe burn, so I placed a dressing of petroleum gauze and told them to come to the clinic the next day. Well, they didn’t show up. A local woman told Julie she knew where they live and passed on a message that they needed to come to the clinic. Again they didn’t come. So we went and looked for them and finally found them. After wandering around the countryside we found their house in sight of our gate. They had removed the dressing and replaced it with some concoction that looked like a cross between manure and tar. It had formed a dry crust over the burn. They said when the dad came home he would bring her to me. Of course no one showed up. Since there was pus draining from under it, I brought her antibiotics and insisted she had to come to the clinic. The next morning on my way to the clinic the dad came up to me in the road. He said he hadn’t brought her because he thought we caused too much pain with dressing changes. Well, she hadn’t had a dressing change and he hadn’t been there when I placed the first dressing. Seems like an excuse because someone wanted to try a local remedy. But he said he would bring her that day. They finally actually showed up. I picked off some of the crust that was loose and slathered the rest with a lot of burn cream. I told them they had to come again the next day. They actually did and the burn cream did a nice job of dissolving the rest of the crust. She came back 3 days later for another dressing change. The burn looks like it is healing nicely and her last dressing will come off Friday.
One day at the clinic we had a man with 2 large cuts to the top of his head from a machete. One was deep enough it went into the skull. This had happened 3 days before. He said his brother in law had done it but he didn’t know why. They came from half way down the mountain, about an hour by moto. They had gone to a local clinic that covered it with gauze. Suturing a wound more than 24 hours after it happened is discouraged due to the risk of infection. In this case I didn’t see a choice because of how deep it was. So I cleaned it and rinsed it the best I could then placed some deep sutures to pull it together and sutured it closed. It came together nicely. The nurses gave him a tetanus booster. I was really worried about infection so we gave him IV ceftriaxone and let them stay in the little house by the clinic for 2 more days of IV antibiotics. We changed the dressing and it looked clean. I gave him oral antibiotics to go home with and told them to come back if it looked infected. Since they haven’t come back I am taking that as good news. Another patient we kept in the TiKay (little house) was a 52 year old man with a severe case of pneumonia. He needed oxygen so we kept him there. He was much better in the morning and able to go home.
Receiving Rice Manna Packs Donated From Love A Child
The mountains are still peaceful. The local markets have less than they used to, but food is still available to those who have money. We brought an ambulance full of donated food from Love a Child last month. That was gone in a week. They didn’t have more to give us as the border by Fond Parisien was closed for a week and they are providing food for a lot of families that fled Ganthier. I bought some rice and oil Saturday to give at the clinic. I am also giving some money every week to our deacon to provide. It’s not a lot compared to the need, but every little bit helps. Fond Parisien has managed to keep out the gangs so far. Love a Child seems to have hired private security from the US and they have a drone to help keep an eye on things. The gangs have attacked unsuccessfully at least once. Keep praying for this country that somehow things can improve. Thank you again for your support!
