Port au Prince

Port au Prince
"He drew me up from the pit of destruction, out of the miry bog, and set my feet upon a rock, making my steps secure." Psalm 40:2

Tuesday, July 28, 2015

First mobile clinic

Today our medical team travelled with Dr. Morquette and staff from King’s Hospital to a mobile health clinic several hours to the east of Port-Au-Prince towards the border with the Dominican Republic.

Dr. Morquette greeting the patients and explaining the operation of the clinic

Our driver Belazar pulled up to the church where the mobile clinic was organized. We saw patients from morning to afternoon with a variety of ailments. Thankfully, we had the most wonderful Creole interpreter and nursing student, Nicholas, to help us communicate with our Haitian patients.

Dr. Grace and I took turns seeing patients and offering each other support, especially on conditions we do not often encounter in our clinical practices. While we had expected to offer our medical skills to help treat patients, with a limited formulary and no access to laboratory equipment, what we often found was the most powerful medicine was our ability to listen to patients talk about their physical and emotional suffering and to offer to pray with patients about it.

Grace examining a patient 

As a doctor, it is often hard to be confronted with what the limits of your (human) power is, but it was nice to be reminded that the healing power of God is limitless.

Pharmacists in action

In addition to examining patients, we were able to offer a limited onsite pharmacy where patients could fill medications if we had them. Our amazing and creative pharmacy staff made do without bottles or bags to dispense medications to over 50 patients. Sarah even learned how to write medication administration directions in Creole!

Thank you to everyone who prayed for our safety travelling to and from our mobile health clinic site. We look forward to going out again on Thursday to the north of Port-Au-Prince and continue to appreciate your prayers for the Haiti team!

- Dr. Danielle

1 comment:

  1. Dear Team,
    Thank you for your wonderful updates! It's become the favorite part of my day to sit and read them each evening. It sounds like things are going wonderfully and I'm so glad. Enjoy every minute of it - it goes sooo quickly! Know the we are thinking of you and praying for you! Hug a few kids for us!
    Tom and Janese Newell

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