Day 12 - Janean

Day 12

Today we had a goat wander into our clinic. Enough said.

Today, Heather coaxed me way, way out of my comfort zone and we got out of our van in Port au Prince and bartered with street vendors for some Haitian art. Let's just say I'm not too good at that. I purchase my item for half of what he started at, but he probably would have gone lower, I was just wanting to get back in the van!

Judeline did great again today; she let Heather put her hand in a bowl of water! She squealed a bit in pain, but then calmed down while listening to the ipod again. Later, I took my hair out of my hairband and she actually ran her LEFT hand through my hair a couple of times. Yeah, Judeline!

Luc Pierre did not have his surgery today. The hospital did not have electricity all day. His two daughters came and talked to the doctor. I'm not exactly clear about what was said, but I think the surgery has either been postponed or cancelled, but I'm not exactly sure.

One of my outpatients today agreed to let me soak her foot and tons of dry skin came off in chunks, all the way down to a stitch that had been left in from her previous surgery. I sent her to the plastic surgeon who was in clinic today, and he removed her stitch and told her how good the original wound was looking. Then she relaxed a bit and did some stretching and walked out of there looking and feeling alot better.

Anise walked several hundred feet today, and she walked about the last 100' with only one crutch. I told her that she has to start doing that so she has one hand free to carry baby Isaac. She looked so tall and proud to be walking with her prosthesis on the left leg, the crutch on the right side and a free arm to carry him!

Water is such a scarcity here. We bring in to work each day six water bottles full (three for us, and three for our translators). In addition, we carry in two gallons in jugs. The patients are not given water in the hospital because they don't have clean water. (The pharmacy has gallon jugs that you can get if you really beg. Claude told me yesterday that he is working on a water purification system and hopes to have one up and running in a few weeks.) Anyway, we have street children hanging around every day and patients, both in and outpatient, that all need water. A small bag of water, pint sized, costs .30 on the street. We have seen Judeline's mom walking down the hill from the hospital to buy water several times. How do these people do this day after day? Keep in mind that the average Haitian gets by on $2.00 per day.

The Scripture says, "For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink. I was a stranger and you invited me in. I needed clothes and you clothed me, I was sick and you looked after me, I was in prison and you came to visit me. Then the righteous will answer him, 'Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you something to drink? When did we see you a stranger and invite you in, or needing clothes and clothe you? When did we see you sick or in prison and go to visit you? The King will reply, 'I tell you the truth, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers of mine you did for me." Matthew 25:35-40.

Lord, help us to be obedient to your Word!

To God be the glory,

Janean

Day 6 - Janean

Hello from Haiti!

Well, we have a serious gas shortage in Haiti, and our wise guest house owner (just like Joseph and the grain in Egypt) has stored gasoline on the property,and although we have gasoline, many people in Haiti do not. There was a line over 2 miles long at the gas station, on our way into town today. This has also affected our patients; we had several that did not come in today. The entire outpatient area was only about half as full as normal due to the shortage. There was less traffic over all, but more people riding tap-taps. Let me describe a tap-tap; it is usually a Nissan truck with a camper shell and benches on either side. There are about 15-20 people inside, and hanging onto the back. We actually saw a man in a three piece suit sitting in the back and also a women in high heels with a laptop on her lap riding a tap-tap. We heard that it costs anywhere between .15 and .50 to ride.

Judeline did absolutely great today; she walked 50' and with a much better gait pattern. She let me massage her forearm and I gave her lotion and she massaged her palm. She has a long way to go on that arm. She did let us put a different brace on it today that actually puts a tiny ("piti-piti")bit of pressure on her palm and that is a good step.

Anise had her baby yesterday by c-section and the baby girl turned out to be a baby boy and she named him Isaac! We all celebated wth her and she had lots of family in to see him.

We have discovered that cream or lotion is a big deal here. Just like Americans want a pill for everything, they want cream. Ky and I lovingly call it "magic cream" amongst ourselves because they all want a little bottle of Eucyrin. And you know what? After we have done everything we can, we give it to them, because it might make them feel just a tiny bit better.

Luke Pierre was a good story from today; he is in his 70's and has a badly fractured left leg with an external fixator. He has four wounds that we are dressing once per day. At first, he was just lying in bed all day, but he has done better everyday and today he ate lunch sitting up in his wheelchair and he hopped 5 steps with the walker. One of our translators recognized him yesterday as a man that used to sell vegetables on the street!

You can pray about the Extreme Home Makeover thing. They have a story they want to tell; we just want the people of Haiti to benefit and the Haitian Community Hospital, because of all the free care they provide. The producer, the prosthetist, and the prosthetics provider will all arrive tomorrow. They are all staying here at the guest house. Twelve people on a missions trip also arrived here tonight.

"The Hole in our Gospel" by Richard Stearns has been a recent inspiration for me. He quotes Rick Warren in chapter seven:

"If God only used perfect people, nothing would get done. God will use anybody if you're available."

To God be the glory!

Janean

Pics from Ky:

Janean and I with Darlene, the woman who wrote and sang us the beautiful song!

Janean and Judalene...a 15 year old whose concrete ceiling collapsed on her....she is so traumatized! She and her mom have lost everything....

And finally, one of all of us with our translators and our makeshift banner.....sorry about the plant in the foreground. It was hard to find someone who knew how to use a camera!

News from Second Team in Haiti

Hi Everyone,

Below is the latest news from Janean Clark and Ky Zeiger who are the second team at the new Global Therapy Group (GTG) clinic. I awoke this morning in a panic. The enormity of what I have taken on hit me and I dissolved into tears thinking, "My volunteers run out in 6 weeks, I have payroll to meet weekly now and I have to return in 2 weeks and don't even have funds for a plane ticket yet!" As has been the pattern since this adventure began, I asked and what I needed was dropped in my lap multiplied by 100. Three hours after my mini-breakdown I received a call from Eric Neufeld a prosthetist who is a friend of a friend in Chicago and runs a foundation setting up prosthetic clinics in South America. He said he had a proposition for me. Extreme Makeover Home Edition wanted to take some prostheses from a young woman here in the states who wanted to donate them to be re-fitted to a child in Haiti . The show was having difficulty finding a place to plug in down there and needed to film this Saturday. He asked if we could make that happen at our new clinic. I made some calls and sent e-mails this afternoon and by dinner we had children identified, the Rainmaker Fund-raising group of guys who were to leave tomorrow changed their tickets to Sunday, they are ordering a big Grand Opening! sign for our clinic, will send it down with Eric and our clinic will be the site of their TV special. I have requested they allow us to put out a request for PT's and OT's nationwide to volunteer to staff our clinic for the next 1-2 years. Isn't God amazing?

Well, we had an absolutely amazing day! I don't think much can top this, as far as our experience goes. First, Judeline is doing well; she transferred with min assist today, bed to w/c. We put an AFO on her with an ortho shoe and she was able to use her left leg to pull herself down the hall and she is getting to therapy much quicker. She walked about 12 feet this morning and about 18 feet this afternoon WITH MINIMAL ASSIST! Anise's c-section was put off until tomorrow, but she did take a long walk today. Darlene, who is in the same room as Judeline was discharged today after Ky took her for a long walk and up and down stairs successfully. She told the translators that she had a gift for us and so we went to her room. She told us that she had no gift to give us but a song that she wrote in our honor. So, she had us sit on the bed, and she sang a song to us, with Gibson translating. Basically, she said how much she appreciated our loving care, and that we showed God's grace in the way we worked with people. She thanked us for coming to Haiti and praised God for His people everwhere. We just sat there with tears running down our cheeks, deeply touched. All we could say was "merci, merci" and hugged her. Sadly, we were so moved, we forgot to take a picture.

Then, I went to the meeting at 2pm with Josiann and Edith, and Barry W Borror, director of Star of Hope. Here is the synopsis of the meeting:

Barry states that Star of Hope's primary donor countries are Sweden , Finland , and the US , with the US being the smallest donor. They work in 18 countries, and were established in 1979. Josian's brother is on the board, and her sister is also on the board, representing legal issues. They have been in Haiti for 24 years. Currently, they have 13 projects in 10 communities in Haiti . First, he offered to build two new operating rooms, at European standards. This includes training staff in the utilization and organization of resources and equipment/supplies. Secondly they offered to bring Cyrec in as a partner to build a prosthetic clinic. They have partnered with them before on several clinics. Cyrec is out of Bogota , Columbia and is the leading prosthetists in all of South America , seeing 3,000 patients per month. They use computer aided technology to make the prosthetics. They are also heavily invested in teaching locals to eventually run the clinic themselves. I told them that our translators would be very interested in training for the clinic. They also provide skills training (computer, office, etc) for the amputees, support for the families in training how to help the amputee patient, and community outreach/accessibility/education. Edith asked if they could send a team down quickly because she knew of three children who needed prosthetics right away. He said that he could, but they were most interested in building a clinic for the long term, not just a short term fix. We would still run the physical therapy for inpatients and outpatients, but they would handle the amputees only. Josian and Edith were going to take it to the hospital board and then, assuming they said yes, they would have the team from Cyrec come in immediately for a meeting to make definite plans. With Josiann's siblings on the Board, I think it is a done deal.

So, we walk out of that meeting and we are met with Larry, who tells us the whole "Extreme Makeover" deal, and they need three kids under the age of 12 for the taping. How cool is that? Edith and Josiann immediately got on their phones and starting calling; the kids will be here Friday to meet with Eric and the film crew. Brad designed a logo for Global Therapy Group and ordered a huge sign that reads "Grand Opening" with the logos of CTG, HCH, and Rainmakers on it. HOW COOL IS THAT? He will send it with Eric. Plus, the extra coverage that the hospital and GTG will get may help you recruit more therapists! We were totally blown away by God's provision yet again. All the translators said "nothing is impossible with God" and they were high fiving us all over the place!

Amazing! To God be the Glory!

Janean

My First Day in Haiti -Janean

Hello from Haiti ! Well, it has been a long day, but a good one. We arrived around 11:30am, and the airport experience was CRAZY, but we eventually found our driver, and drove to the hospital. The traffic here is absolutely chaotic; there are no lanes, people are honking their horns and yelling, there are UN trucks going by with guys with machine guns on top, and at the same time, goats, pigs, and dogs wandering the street. There are ladies walking with buckets of water on their heads and lots and lots of rubble and tent cities.

We were oriented at the hospital from 12:30 to around 6:30 pm, and it is quite overwhelming. I am getting all the names of people mixed up, between the patients, the employees, the administrators, and the volunteers. Toward the end of the day I started to feel a little more comfortable, but Monday is going to be interesting in the least, without Donna here. She told me that she already told the administrator that I would go with her to the meeting on Tuesday (with all those important people - the Haitian Minister of Health, the World Health Organization, etc, etc). She thought that I was the obvious choice since I am here for two weeks and so I can go to two meetings.

We have three interpreters who are going to stay with us the whole time. (that' the good news). The bad news is, we have to pay them privately at the end of each week. The hospital had been paying them, but that ended today. Their agreed rate is $4 per day, and they are working Mon-Sat. So, I am expected to pay each of them $24, and then give them a $20 tip, each week. Ky and I will split the costs for all three interpreters. They are pretty important though, and make the work easier. My personal interpreter's name is Alex; the other two are Gibson and Emmanuel.

Donna has already changed the name of our group to "Global Therapy Group" - does that surprise you? :)

I saw two inpatients this afternoon, one of which was the pregnant woman who is an amputee. She has not had her baby yet, but it will be any day. Her stump is much better (not as swollen), and she walked about 100' with a walker today. The other patient will be my special project. Her name is Judilene and she is 15. She has a below the knee amputation on the right, and an ankle injury on the left and a severe wrist injury with a tendon transplant on the left. She was just curled up in the corner not moving and not talking to anyone 4 days ago, and now she is walking about 15' with the walker and moderate assist. She has a long way to go, and she is kind of moody and suspicious of us, but begrudgingly does her therapy if she gets two stickers afterwards to decorate her wheelchair. I'll do my best to win her over. :)

The construction guys put up the center wall of the new outpatient clinic today, and they are putting the tarp (the roof) on tomorrow. They had two largepieces of tarp that needed to be sewn together. There were no needles, so they pounded out a nail and made an eye in the top, and made homemade needles. So we spent the last two hours or so sitting on the top of the hospital roof (that's where they are camping out), sewing by hand this large tarp. We finished and then sealed it with duct tape. The ribbon cutting ceremony is tomorrow, and we open the outpatient clinic on Monday!

Our driver came at 6:30, and it took us about an hour to get up the mountain to the guest house. It is very pretty up here, and cool. The city was very hot today and the hospital didn't have power all day, so we had no fans and no lights. Dinner was very nice; fish, green beans, rice, and a kind of warm potato salad. Then we had about an hour downpour of rain.

I'm pretty tired now; it's 10:10 here, but it's been a very long, but fun day. We have church tomorrow (3 hours long) and then we are going to visit the orphanage, so that should be fun.

Blessings to all!

Janean