Haiti
2011 Update
In November 2011 a third neo-natal resuscitation course was successfully completed. Participants came from 6 hospitals and 4 schools of nursing and spent 4 days learning basic neonatal resuscitation and care for newborns. The program also trains trainers and part of the week was spent supervising the new Haitian trainers as they taught the program. A further course is planned for 2012. Each participating hospital and nursing school received the equipment, books and resources to continue teaching the program on their own. We will be returning to Haiti to provide continued support.
We also provided pediatric textbooks and equipment to the Jeremie School of Nursing this year who were using books printed in 1953!
Emergency Response
Rose Charities sent its first medical team 5 days after the earthquake and continued to send teams until May 15th 2010. We respect the Haitian doctors and nurses who have worked heroically throughout this disaster, and we try to assist in ways that are helpful and supportive by working with local partners. Our first teams went to St. Marc and Gonieve in the North, where they assisted in emergency surgery. Later teams assisted the pediatric ward at L’Hopitale Communaute in Port-au-Prince and a team joined with partner organization, AMDA, to work at a cholera treatment centre in Fonds des Negres.
State University School of Nursing
During the earthquake the State University School of Nursing collapsed, burying the 2nd and 3rd year students. 93 students were rescued but 74 students and staff were killed and the school was completely destroyed. Our visiting Rose Charities nurses met the Head of the school and discovered that the surviving students badly needed help. Despite the trauma and loss of their friends, they wanted to get back to school and finish their education. Many needed trauma counseling and all needed textbooks and supplies. We were able to link-up the school with a grief counseling team that was in the country and we undertook to provide the supplies to get the school to re-open. The school currently has three tents to use as classrooms supplied by UNICEF, but needed teaching equipment. Our next task was to find nursing textbooks written in French. With the help of the McGill School of Nursing in Montreal we were able to send 2 shipments of new text-books. We also organized and sent a 40 ft container of educational equipment that was donated and purchased for the school. Five teaching mannequins were donated by Laerdal. We have essentially provided all the tools to create a nursing teaching lab.
Sustainable Neo-Natal Education
One of the Haitian pediatricians (Emmeline LeBours) working with our relief workers at the Haitian Community Hospital asked for support related to pediatric and neonatal education, so health care workers in Haiti can improve health care and decrease the morbidity and mortality rate for infants and children. A subcommittee of Rose Charities was formed in the spring of 2010 to develop a neonatal course in collaboration with key members of the Haitian Ministry of Health, administrators from two universities, and administrators/staff from three hospitals within Port-au-Prince.
Haitian Pediatric Association
Before the earthquake Haiti trained its own pediatricians in a joint program with the America Academy of Pediatrics (AAP). Since the earthquake the country lost many of its pediatricians and the program stopped. Rose Charities has been involved in rebuilding this program in partnership with the Haitian Pediatric Association and the AAP by sending pediatric nurses to assist in teaching the pediatric residents. We also helped maintain a house in Port au Prince that acts as a place for volunteers to stay and as an office.
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