Sherry's Journal

Love in Action...

February 26, 2010

The beginning of the journal today is not a Creole Proverb or a Bible verse, but something Bobby always says...

"Love is not just something you talk about, love is something you do..."

I know it is very hard to understand how intense and busy we are here in Haiti now that we have a hospital and recovery camp right here on our property. Even with pictures and words, so much is not communicated. We are seeing so many "good hearts" since the earthquake. Everyone is stepping up and doing what needs to be done, regardless of the efforts involved. Even when something seems impossible, we are seeing the possible...

These guys look like they are up to something...

And they are. Here is an example of what we mean when we say we are seeing "love in action." Dr. Stu, a retired Orthopedic surgeon from Virginia, was here working with Operation Smile at the LAC Disaster Relief Center. He worked in the surgery area and needed blades for one of the tools they use to do skin grafting.

Rad, LAC employee, heard of Dr. Stu's need for the blades. Rad took all the information one Sunday afternoon, and by the following week, he had the exact grafting blades needed by the plastic surgeons hand delivered to the LAC Disaster Relief Center. Rad was able to secure a spot on a plane carrying other supplies and cargo to Haiti.

We are so thankful to all the people that helped get these blades to Haiti. We thank Bill Wagner with Integra Life Sciences who worked very hard to have the Padgett dermatome blades flown to him in Florida and delivered to Chris Thompson, an LAC employee, at 6AM one morning. Then, Chris drove the blades to Mike Wnek in Lakeland, who then flew them with his doctors and medical gear in a chartered aircraft to Barahona in the Domincan Republic. Once landing in the Dominican Republic, Mike made the journey across the border to the Love A Child Village and delivered the blades to the surgeons at the LAC Disaster Relief Center. With so many people joining efforts, we were able to get the critical instruments to the hands of the doctors in less than a week.

A happy surgeon...

Here is Dr. Noel Natoli of Penn State - Hershey Hospital, working with Operation Smile, and Rad, LAC employee, with the blades in Haiti. She said, "the surgical teams are thrilled to finally have these necessary skin grafting blades, so now we do not have to keep using the initial set of disposable blades."

So much great work is being done here at the hospital.

These grafting blades will help with surgeries like the young woman's below. The surgeons had to take skin from her upper thigh to repair a huge gash on the top of her foot. These blades will make a difference!

Woman with skin graft

We thank all of you for going the "extra mile" for the poor Haitian people.

Another act of "love in action..."

This is Dr. Larry Nathanson who worked in the Love A Child Disaster Relief Center for eight days. He is a doctor of emergency medicine at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center in Boston.

When he first arrived, he noticed there wasn't a modern, digital way for the medical professionals to track their patients. They were using postings on a bulletin board and notes on a board.

Dr. Larry, working with an organization called Operational Medicine Institute, was a member of the 4th team to deploy to the LAC Disaster Relief Center under the "Health IT Rescue" project. There were 3 prior teams before Dr. Larry was at the LAC Disaster Relief Center. They began an enormous amount of work to lay the foundation for Dr. Larry to help develop an efficient system using modern technology to track patients and get patient information to the medical staff. We are thankful for the effort, skill and dedication of the first 3 teams as their work helped Dr. Larry create a system that will be used for the coming months.

http://www.loveachild.com/uploads/pagesfiles/3520.jpg

Dr. Larry and his IT partner back in Boston, Charlie Johnson, set out to fix, not only the patients, but also the way the medical staff provides treatment. With a foundation already in place, he and Charlie developed new custom software to allow each patient's information to be accessible by the medical staff. Now, the patient information is sent to every doctor and nurse via his or her iphone or Blackberry. Their system lists all patients, shows photos of their injury and their face for identification purposes, their location within the growing camp of patient tents, their condition, their treatments, which medical team is attending them, their medications, prognosis, and even each patient's X-rays digitally attached to their patient file.

Now, David Callaway, Director of Operational Medicine Institute, and Dr. Scott Murray, Emergency Medicine at Beth Israel Deaconess has rotated here to the Love A Child Diaster Relief Center after Dr Larry. Dr Scott emphasized how critical everyones role was in making the electronics work for the hospital, including Clay Heaton who developed the capability to electronically track all the huge inventory of critical medical supplies, foods, clothes, etc in the "depot" which is the Love A Child church.

We thank Joyce Meyer Ministries - Hand of Hope for the donated X-ray equipment. It is making a huge difference in treatment here at the LAC Disaster Relief Center.

We are so thankful for what Dr. Larry, Charlie and everyone involved with Operational Medicine Institute did to improve the high level of care our patients are receiving. Even in America, no one has this capability at this time.

We have many hands working here and we have many hands who are not here, but who are working just as hard to help our Haitian friends. Those of you not on the mission field, but who are supporting us with your financial gifts and prayers are doing "great works" too. Please keep praying for us on the mission field and continue to pray about how you can help the people here.

The needs are many, if you would like to give a gift to our Earthquake Disaster Relief Fund, please click on the red button below and donate now.

Love,

Sherry

Sherry's Journal