Sonje Haiti

My 9 weeks in Haiti has come to an end. As I sit and reflect on my experience here, I am having a hard time putting my thoughts into words. Where do I start? The last 9 weeks have been some of the most eye-opening, beautiful, frustrating, heart-wrenching, gratifying, and memorable weeks of my life. I am so thankful to each and every one of you for making these last 2 months possible!

The transition home will not be easy but there are many things I am looking forward to at home.

 

We have celebrated many successes throughout my time here! Let me name a few for you and without you these would not have been possible.

·        We are treating 350 kids for malnutrition in 5 locations this year

·        100 Woman have been screened for cervical cancer and we will be following up with the positive results in the spring

^·          1000 patients have been treated since October 8^th

·        We now have an office space with cabinets, that has the medications in order on shelves (for those of you who are health professionals you know how important this is) It will also be an area for our Haitian staff to work and to hold educational sessions

·        Educated Helping Haitian Angels orphans on topics like sanitation, sexual health, human anatomy, domestic violence, puberty, menstruation, first aid, dental health, manners

·        Started a woman’s group that has educated local woman on pregnancy, nutrition, breastfeeding, sexual health, domestic violence, breast exams, the human body, fibroids, mental health, skin cancer

·        Took two children to the dentist to get much needed fillings and teeth pulled

·        Networked with a ton of amazing people working towards a common goal making Haiti a healthier place

·        Played guitar for the rehab patients and helped out the nannies at the maison de benediction 

A huge thank-you to my new family at the HHA village; I couldn’t have asked for a better group of people to hang out with.

I’m looking forward to my return to Haiti in the near future and for whatever adventure awaits me next!

Stories of Children in our Malnutrition Program

My name is Pierre Santania; I am the grandmother of Nerveline Derionise. I could never say that my little girl was beautiful because of her illnesses and even more so the fact that she was malnourished. Since the arrival of the Hands up for Haiti program in Jolitrou she has completely changed. She is much more settled and she is above all very beautiful. My wish is that more malnourished children are treated thanks to this program and that this program continues to grow thanks to God.

 

My name is Jocelyne Plizee; I am the mother of Celestin Frandley. I have visited many health care centres with my son but I’ve never seen any improvement, however when Hands up for Haiti arrived with their program I can say that it was for my son. My son has been healed and it’s a miracle for my family. Thank-you Hands up, God bless you.

Meet Winelay Charles. He is about a year and a half old and weighs 6.68 kg. He was referred to us by Dr. Jenty our doctor at Shada. He is severely malnourished. When we asked his mother what he eats she stated ‘nothing’. When we probed a bit further she stated he eats crackers. The child was extremely dehydrated. Thanks to Hands up for Haiti and MFK this child has a chance to get healthy, build up his immune system and live a happier, healthier life.

 

Meet Pierre Elfin. He was born March 19 2014 and was abandoned by his mother. A family member brings him to the malnutrition clinic every Wednesday. His admission weight to program was 5.82 kg. His goal weight is 7.03. He is severely malnourished. He has a history of reoccurring diarrhea which is all too common for kids here in Haiti.

 

Struggles

Multiple times a week I hear or see things here that break my heart into small pieces. There are times where I just wish I had all the solutions to questions that so often I get asked. 

There is many times where I wish I had a magic wand that could take away pain, suffering, hunger, poverty, sickness, malnutrition, dirty water in a matter of seconds. Unfortunately that magic wand does not exist.

I would like to share with you a story about a young mother I had the honour of meeting this past week during one of our malnutrition project outreaches in a town called Madeline.

At the young age of 16 she has a beautiful baby girl. You could see the unconditional love she had for her little one, but she was struggling. Her little one was severely malnourished. A part of our malnutrition program is to conduct a survey with the parents asking questions that will help us to understand their problems and to help them better. One of the questions we ask is how many times a day your family eats and how much money a day is spent on food. Her answer one to two meals a day (sometimes) and she has no money to buy food. She gets food whenever someone gives it to her and a lot of time she finds herself at the local orphanage asking for food. I asked if she had access to clean water the answer, no. Our programs are trying to increase access to these necessities of life and to increase education.

Life here in Haiti is beautiful, but daily things we take for granted are a struggle for those elsewhere in the world.

Trip to the Dentist

I have now had the chance to make two visits to the local dentist with 3 little girls that we had identified as having dental caries and teeth that needed to be pulled on one of our clinics at Helping Haitian Angels orphanage.

2 out of the 3 little girls had to have teeth pulled and both had to go back for a second time this past week to have another tooth pulled. Next week I will be making one more trip to the dentist for fillings for the one little girl.

The dentist office was very primitive but they used anesthetic and according to the locals he has been practising forever and is one of the best! I felt awful as these little ones were not very happy after getting their teeth pulled :( In terms of price it is very cheap compared to North America. It has only cost about $40.00 American so far!

I took this time to educate the families and children the importance of decreasing sweets in their diet and to continue to brush their teeth at least twice a day.

It’s taken me awhile to process the week of Nov 2^nd and this is why this blog post is so late. Nov 2^nd was the start of torrential rain and also the arrival of one of our global health Hands up for Haiti teams. The team arrived and made their way to one of our communities called Bod me Limbe close to the ocean. I stayed behind with two of the trip members to finalize the plans for the rest of the week. What we didn’t know is that the rain had no plans on stopping any time soon. The weather reports here are far from accurate. The good news our team was safe and well taken care of by our Haitian staff! What I didn’t know was how badly the Haitians were affected, until Tuesday morning when I ventured into town to access the damage.

 

I could not believe my eyes. Homes were flooded, people standing outside in water past their knees in some places. One of the communities Hands up for Haiti supports and where our clinic is located was completely flooded. It is one of the slums, named Shada. The river had overflown into their homes, most of their belongings ruined. This is too common of an experience for these people. People were displaced and brought to safe shelters to protect them from the rain. Just when I thought I couldn’t see any more devastation I was shown by my Haitian friend a picture of a dead child on the side of the road that had drowned in the floods. I wondered why someone would leave their child on the side of the road. I quickly learned that parents put them there so the government will pick them up and give them a proper burial which they could not afford. During this visit I stopped at an area called La Fossette where we were going to do a clinic at on Friday. There I saw an awful site of people dragging a pig through tons of water and the sound that the pig was making was one I will not forget. Then I was told as I was getting back in the car that there was a knife fight happening down the road. At this point I could barely contain my tears.

 

Shada was the community our team was supposed to run clinics in on Thursday and Friday and there was no way we were going to be able to do that with the flooding. On Friday afternoon after most of the water had receded and we were able to access the damage of our clinic and community. What saddened me the most was the piles of people’s belongings in piles along the boulevard awaiting someone to come and take them away. A constant reminder of what they had lost. Mattresses were lying out in the sun drying out. We lost a lot of our medications that were located in the clinic and our medika mamba which we use for our malnutrition program there on Wednesdays. Tables, fans, scales, drawers, were all ruined. We knew we had to get our team back to Cap Haitian and away from the ocean. So Tuesday afternoon the team walked to a safe place that our vehicles could get to and made their way back to Cap Haitian. I immediately went into planning mode as basically all of our original plans had been ruined. Thank goodness for the all the lovely people Amanda and I have made connections with over the past 4 weeks here. The team only ended up missing one clinical day due to rain. On Wednesday we worked at an orphanage called Helping Haitian angels and saw over 100 children, some of who were very sick. Thursday we split the team some heading to Madeline an area that has a public clinic run by the local health ministry. The rest of us headed up to the mountainside to a clinic at Fort St. Bougeious; there we saw roughly 100 children. Friday was a very interesting experience that I had been working on with the help of one of my friends here for many weeks. The UN had informed us that they were aware of an area that really needed help; an area that had no real access to health care. It is known as “the ghetto”.  We saw roughly 150 children there and were impressed with the health status of these children. Most of them had minor health problems.

On Saturday we screened about 90 women for the HPV virus. If the swab comes back positive, which takes about 6-8 weeks then Dr. Jaeger who is from Minnesota will come back in the spring to do the VIA test and perform cryotherapy on positive woman. We had Haitian doctors and nurses working alongside the American nurses and doctors learning how to do the procedure. This is a program that I hope will continue into the future. My hope is that these women will be able to visit the hospital/clinic whenever they want to be tested for cervical cancer and that the Haitian medical professionals will continue to be trained in evidence based procedures. It was an emotionally exhausting week for all of us here on the ground. Please continue to keep the Haitian’s in your thoughts and prayers. They continue to be the most resilient people I have ever met.

 

 

Citadel

This weekend we went on an excursion to the Citadel! The Citadel is an historical landmark in Haiti that was built in the early 1800’s after Haiti declared Independence. It was built by Roi Christophe who died in 1820. They built this structure up on top of a mountain to protect themselves from the French but it was never used. There are cannons and cannon balls from the 1800’s still at the monument.

 

It is about 3 hours to hike the whole thing so we rode moto’s (a Haitian motorbike) to the top parking lot and then walked from there which took about a half hour. And that was enough with the heat and steep incline! 

 

The neat part is that Haiti is really trying hard to increase their tourism industry as it is a beautiful country! I visited the Citadel 4 years ago on one of my first trips to Haiti and so much has changed. In the parking lot area before you walk up there is now sheltered areas for the woman to sell their merchandise, areas to eat and bathrooms! I was so shocked. Once you get up to the citadel there are brand new washrooms, railings over the dangerous parts, informative signs, etc! I love seeing the changes that are happening to this amazing country!

Cervical Cancer Screening Program

Partnerships are a key part of making projects successful in Haiti. Before coming here we were contacted by a Dr. from the US who wanted to start a cervical cancer screening program here. We gladly offered to help out with the project. Once we got here we hit the ground running trying to find a place to be able to implement this program. I was then introduced to Dr. Travant a local Haitian doctor who graciously offered to run the program at the hospital she works, Fort St. Michel. After a couple weeks of skyping, meetings, emails, phone calls and fingers crossed that all would go over well we started the screening!

 

When we showed up there was a bit of a mix-up in communication. The women were told to show up on Nov 7^th not today, but hey it’s Haiti! By 1100 after calling the woman they started to arrive. Things here may not always go as you exactly plan, but it all works out in the end! 90 women ended up showing up to get their height, weight, BP taken and to be asked questions about their sexual health. On Friday we saw 42 more ladies. They then will come back on Nov 8^th for the HPV swab; it then gets sent to the lab in Port au Prince and takes about 6-8 weeks to obtain the results. Those who are positive will come back for further testing for cervical cancer. Nov 8^th will also be a time for education on HPV and cervical cancer.

 

The exciting news is that we are able to use money from our donations to fund this entire project! A huge thank you goes out to those who donated to our trip, you are helping women in Haiti to live longer, cancer free lives!

This past week we were able to help start up 2 malnutrition programs in different towns in Cap Haitian. Working alongside the Haitian staff is by far one of the best ways to ensure that our projects are sustainable when we are not here! The first area we visited on Monday was a place called Jolitrou. A team had visited and ran a clinic there in June and saw the immense need as there were many malnourished children. Our goal for this community is to treat 50 children by June. We use the product called Plumpy Nut as you learned about in a previous post. We ended up seeing around 50 children on Monday and admitted 11 into our program. I will give you a little background on how we know whether or not the child needs to be admitted into the program and how the program works.

First off you take their weight and height, then compare it to a chart that has 3 area’s, green, yellow and red. If their weight falls in the green, then they are not malnourished. If it falls between the yellow and the green then they are underweight. If it falls in the yellow or below they are moderately malnourished and if their weight is in the red they are severely malnourished. We then take their arm circumference which can also give us vital information on their state of malnutrition. They then sit down and get their picture taken and get asked an admission questionnaire. This questionnaire asks questions like what do you eat, has any of your children died, do you drink treated water, etc. This helps us understand better ways to help the people in the community and the reasons why their child may be malnourished. The nurses then educate the family about topics including handwashing, nutrition, etc. They are then give so many sachets of plumpy nut which is decided based on their weight. They may have to eat 2-4 of the sachets a day. Also throughout the program they are given a dose of albendazole (treatment for worms), chlorox for treating their water and amoxicillin (antibiotic). The child has to be between the ages of 6-59 months to be eligible for the program.

The child is normally in the program between 8-12 weeks depending on the severity. The goal is that they gain weight and are in the green category for their weight-height ratio. Another goal is that they understand the causes of malnutrition and ways to prevent it from happening again!

Tarantula Escapade Frété

So for the most part living in Haiti is pretty great! The most beautiful people, warm weather, beautiful mountains, vast oceans, yummy fruit and veggies, and a colourful culture….but then there’s the not so beautiful things…..big, hairy, scary, tarantulas.

One night not too long ago Amanda came sauntering into the main dining area and was in a state of panic, she was trying to hide how scared she was but you could see the fear in her eyes. She then proceeded to tell us that she had been stuck in the room for the last half hour because a tarantula was right outside our bedroom door. She was tempted to even facebook me to come and help her out but after spitting on the spider and shining her light on it, it moved far enough away from the door that she could run as fast as she could away from this hairy creature. She then told us she had been texting people at home to ask them if tarantulas existed in Haiti. Then it was time to show us the picture she took of it…and I was thinking oh it doesn’t look that big until we all decided to go and have show and tell time. 

Honestly I never really realized spiders that big existed and yes I have been here 5 times and this was my first time seeing a tarantula. Let’s just say I ended up on a chair!

Knowledge is Power

One of our goals of this trip was to plan a women's group where people could come and talk about issues in the community, about their health, lifestyle, and daily difficulties. We had discussed
our group for 8 months prior to this trip and had some worries about the success and the sustainability of the group. Prior to arriving, we had Dr.Dieula tell people in the community Bois De Lance
about the group we would be having on Tuesdays at 4 pm. Dr. Dieula warned us that only 10 women may show up due to lack of knowledge about what the program may entail.

At 4 pm 6 women were sitting in the courtyard area where the group was to be held. We were happy to see those 6 people because we had prepared to talk about breast self exams and the anatomy of a woman. Typical of Haitian time, people started arriving in groups of 2-3 and eventually over 40 women were present for our discussion (this might be because they heard we were handing out cookies and cold beverages haha).

Hope opened the discussion with a beautiful guitar song 'How great thou art' and soon enough the women were all singing along in perfect time (with the help of our
translator and beautiful musical director, Sandra). We discussed breast self exams and had women demonstrate how to do them and answer questions about why to do them and what to do if
they notice changes in their breast. We went on to discuss human anatomy, urinary tract infections and intestinal problems that we had been seeing frequently in our clinics. Women showed interest
 and asked great questions about the body and their health and even described experiences they had with health care and abnormal breast exams. Lastly we discussed that women have a urethra and a vagina as some of the women in Haitians are not taught this basic anatomy (they thought it was only one hole)! We were amazed by the enthusiasm and participation of the group and felt blessed to be a part of the session.

The women told us some subjects they would like to talk about in the coming weeks including mental health and violence. We closed the session with Amazing Grace and when Haitian women sing boy is it a beautiful sound.

The success of our first week was rewarding because not only did we have a group of women motivated to learn more about their health, but we also found a lovely nurse willing to take over the group!

In the coming weeks we hope to share healthy snacks and teach about  nutrition to the women and continue to sing and learn together.

Pictures to follow tomorrow:)

Thankful

On Monday Oct 13 we went to two different locations on site visits. Our morning visit was to a place called Meds Food Kids or more commonly known here as MFK. It was started in 2003 by a Dr. Patricia Wolff. They employ 40 local Haitians. They test peanuts from all over the world that will grow the best in Haiti’s dry climate. So far it sounds like India’s peanuts grow the best here. They try as hard as they can to use the Haitian peanuts but they grow a lot of the bacteria called aflatoxin which is detrimental to children’s health. So the peanuts all have to be tested very well before it is ready to be used. They test it in labs at the factory and also in the states. We were led by two awesome tour guides Martina and Racha who gave us a tour of the factory. The factory makes a lifesaving supplement here called Medika Mamba or Plumpy Nut! You may be wondering what is this life saving stuff you speak of? It’s literally peanut butter full of calories, vitamins and minerals! Peanuts save lives here in Haiti and all over the world. There are three different products they create plumpy nut, plumpy supp and vita mamba which are all used a little differently.

Plumpy nut is used for severely malnourished children according to their height and weight and can only be used for those greater than 6 months of age. It contains 500 calories! That’s right 500 calories!

Plumpy supp is for moderately malnourished children and also contains 500 calories.

Vita mamba is for children 3 years and up and is a supplement and has many vitamins and mineral also. It costs 23 cents per snack.

In the afternoon we visited one of our translator’s Guindy’s church community called Caracol. This community is near one of the industrial parks that employs Haitians. I understood it as a sweat shop but it does provide electricity to the community for a cheap rate. The community is lacking health care and only has a doctor visit the community 1-2 times a year. There is NO clinic in this community of  6000 people. The closest clinic is an hour and a half away by public transport. We met Guindy’s pastor who gave us a tour of an orphanage, school and two churches. The churches would be where we would run our clinics. We would be able to educate in the schools about sexual health, puberty, menstruation and domestic violence.  The Pastor told us that the Haitian government has pulled out funding for feeding the kids while they are school and that 400 children attend the school. The orphanage has 10 girls and they are hoping to expand in the near future.  We are hoping to run a clinic in this community in the near future and bring healthcare which is a basic need that is lacking!

 

 

 

Today was my first full day in Haiti. Hope spent a lot of time preparing me for this trip with stories and photos of her experiences but I’m not sure any of it really sunk in. Our job today was to connect with part of the Hands up for Haiti team (2 doctors, 2 nurses and 2 translators and a pharmacist) and run a clinic in Shada which is a very poor area in Haiti. As we begun driving towards the town I smelt garbage burning, I saw people carrying huge heavy things on their head (I didn’t know people still did that!),I saw groups of people bathing in basins outside their home and hand washing their clothing, there were people everywhere! When we pulled into Shada I saw garbage covering a stream of water and even some naked children eliminating their feces in the garbage. I looked around to try and find some sort of building that ACTUALLY seemed like liveable accommodations. I could not find a bed inside a single home, no houses with windows to protect them from the deadly mosquitos, no running water or even clean water. In Haiti there are no stop signs, or lane limits, the traffic is terrifying! 

On the drive to Shada I looked out my window and saw a dead dog which a man was literally pulling off the side of the road with a long piece of metal ( for those of you who know me you understand how truly traumatizing this was ). I instantly started crying and had Hope pep talk me to keep it together for our first clinic. My heart was broken. I held my ground and walked into the Shada clinic where we immediately got to work triaging and having the doctors see the patients who wait up to 4 hours in the heat to see a doctor. The people waiting were patient and kind. I did not hear one complaint about the wait time, or how they have a meeting to be at, or a reason why someone should be seen before someone else. The patients were respectful, appreciative and kind. 

One boy, aged 17, no money to go to school, sat patiently waiting with his notebook which had some English words written on it. When finally seeing the physician we were shocked to realize his age, as he looked no more than 11 and was severely malnourished. He told us he has no parents and no one to look after him. He has no way of getting food or water and no money to pay for school. There are no resources or housing for him, nowhere we can refer this poor boy. I mention his notebook because despite him having nothing, he was driven and studying English independently. He was independently driven to learn and do well. 

The clinic experience turned out amazing, we saw many more people with the same stories of no family, no money for food, and a few which we referred to the hospital for a higher level of care. We managed to help about 50 patients. I think we can all learn a lesson from the Haitian patients (I like to call them Hatients... haha Amanda joke). We are so lucky to have health care! To have food, water, doctors, homes. We do not need to complain and whine about waiting to see our doctors, and being rude or disrespectful even when we see them! We are so lucky to have what we have.