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Quisqueya News: Tuesday, January 26

Here’s the latest from the QCS Relief Coordination Center:

New medical teams from a church in Fairfax (Virginia), Water for Life, Operation Blessing (Florida), the Netherlands, Trinidad & Tobago, and Kinder not Hilfe (Germany) have arrived to treat earthquake victims. In addition, representatives from the Haitian Ministry of Heath and Airline Ambassadors have become involved in our coordination efforts, resulting in increased cooperation between aid groups and efficiency. In the last few days we have begun to implement three new efforts to better serve injured Haitians: inter-facility patient transfer, evening shifts at hospitals, and shifting post-operative patients to facilities outside the city for follow-up care.One major medical problem has been that often a patient arrives at a hospital or clinic, only to discover that the specialists or equipment needed to best treat him are in another location. For example, only one or two locations in Port-au-Prince are currently equipped to perform C-sections or have obstetricians. The goal of our inter-facility transfer effort is to compile lists of specialists and equipment throughout the city and then move patients to the best location. A second major issue is that there are only a few functional operating rooms in the city, but hospitals are closing around 4 or 5 pm. Adding a night shift to work from dusk until around midnight will double the number of surgeries that can be performed. A third challenge is that after patients receive treatment or operations, there are no facilities for follow-up care in the overcrowded hospitals. Our effort now is to locate hospitals further outside Port-au-Prince with vacancies so that follow-up care may continue after initial surgeries and treatment.

So far we have been able to connect with the US Navy to transfer 8 patients with spinal cord injuries to the University of Miami. Another 6 post-operative patients have been transferred within Haiti.One of the highlights of this QCS relief effort is our nightly 8 pm meeting for leaders of each medical team. The group tackles logistical problems as a team, brainstorming about how to overcome challenges such as hospitals lacking an operating room scheduler, the lack of blood banks, and how to care for patients in a hospital lacking running water or electricity. They also share stories of encouragement. One doctor shared how his hospital had delivered a baby that day without any obstetricians, and that the baby was born not breathing. After several tense minutes and hard work, the baby began to breathe again and had a heartbeat. Praise God!
Another highlight of our Quisqueya relief effort is serving the children of our Haitian staff members who have lost their homes and are temporarily staying on campus.

Tags: relief