Earthquake up close

Since I’m not often not home long enough to properly care for a dog, my pets of choice have become plants. Having forgotten to ask my roommate to water them, I’m anticipating that my ‘pets’ will be somewhat wilted when I return from Haiti. But I also know that they are all succulent plants, built to withstand periods without water, and that after even a single watering they will markedly perkier and hold themselves up straighter. That dramatic resurrection exactly describes how I felt in the process of sitting down for dinner tonight. At the beginning of the meal, unable to do more than smile in response to conversation; gradually gaining strength as I worked through Tasso (Haitian beef in a wonderful sauce), green beans, rice with beans, and fried plantains; to significantly much more energy and so much happier at the end of the meal. Today was a long, productive, and wonderful day.

Perhaps the biggest misconception about our work here is that we are fixing everything that was damaged in the earthquake. Yes, we were brought here as part of the relief effort. But I hate to break your bubble: Most of this equipment was in very bad shape before the Richter scale read 7-plus. Only one of the pieces of equipment had problems from the earthquake, as far as we could tell. Justin spent a large part of the day tracing the circuitry on this autoclave, resealing the door, and adding a grounding wire to the casing so it wouldn’t shock the person who was trying to sterilize the equipment. Come the end of the day, we were testing the equipment with some of the nurses… and lo and behold… found another problem. It’s exactly like the Tom and Jerry type cartoon where Tom is trying to stop a leak with is finger when another breaks out and before you know it he’s covered in water. The door of the autoclave no longer leaked, but of course now water was leaking out the corroded back of the machine.

Overall, we managed to fix 7 pieces of equipment in a half day at one hospital. We recorded touching 15 pieces of equipment, some of which could easily be fixed with the correct parts – like a halogen bulb. The pieces that were fixed were addressed largely because of some knowledge beforehand that allowed us to bring the appropriate tools and replacement parts. Unfortunately, the hospital we visited today does not have a trained biomedical staff to do regular equipment maintenance. The designated technician wasn’t around quite enough for us to train him all that effectively. Fortunately, the nurses were well versed in their equipment and very attentive to details. It’s exciting to see someone bring you something that is an easy fix, repair it, and in the process show them how to prevent or solve that problem in the future.

The trip home from our hospital seemed surreal. We had spent the night in the Dominican Republic the night before, so it was a rush from hotel to airport to hotel to first hospital this morning. When I finally got a chance to take in the scene on the way home, it was as if the news reels were running outside my window. Except they were life-size, complete with the smells and humidity, and the reporter’s narration was satisfyingly absent.

Our third team member, a biomedical technician in the US, grew up in southern Haiti. We stopped on a rubble filled street in front of a two-story house with collapsing balcony and crumbled foundation strewn about. This was his mother’s house, his home during high school and college. Now it was not even remotely liveable, all his belongings having been looted. As he mourned the loss of his personal library, we asked if he would tell his mother about the scene or show her the pictures we’d taken. “No, no… she doesn’t need to know this.”