By Miriam Tuchman | President, Sustainable Healthcare for Haiti
In January, a group of medical professionals and other volunteers from the States joined Haitian Doctors, Interns and Translators to inaugurate the Sho-Ping Chin Clinic for Healthcare and Education Building.
Sustainable Healthcare for Haiti (SHH), Northeast Haiti Ministry (MHM), PoumonTEK (PT), the Alphonse Brothers Translation and Transportation Services (AB), Sniffen Pictures (SP), Environmental Products (EP) and Fondation Montesinos (FM) kicked off the wellness program for 500 children who attend the FM school in Titanyen. SHH and PT already team up to provide a primary healthcare program for the 90 children who live and learn at FM under the guidance of Father Charles. This clinic began what the partners hope will be a sustainable program for wellness for all of the children on the campus.
During the five days in January, the team worked to finalize the water filtration system so that it can produce sufficient water to supply the community as well as a future agricultural project that will be run by the children; set up the operational flow and stocked the clinic for future use; trialed a new electronic medical documentation system; saw 500 new pediatric patients and a few adult patients who are staff; traveled to the Artibonite valley to finish gathering video and images for an upcoming documentary; provided professional training for medical staff; identified and secured treatment for a child in crisis from a genetic disease; and brainstormed together for the future. We were all struck by, and affected by, the fuel shortages that have been plaguing Haiti. The history of this situation dates back centuries. However, thanks to the design of the clinic building and despite the lack of electricity due to the lack of fuel, the clinic remained bright and cool from natural solar and wind sources.
Our goals as partners will always be to provide a sustainable program that includes the children as partners in developing knowledge for their own well being and that of their community; and education is an integral part of the process. As the clinic process progresses, the team’s plans will expand to include professional training days, education days, patient follow up visits and new patient visits. Electronic documentation and programming are keys to the sustainability of the program. We saw that many children suffer from basic infections and genetic diseases which the world has long since had cures for. Sometimes the cure requires medication but it always requires education and access to information. It also requires partnerships which reach beyond government borders and which provide the strength to combat the idea that people should also have borders.
PT will continue to provide weekly primary healthcare and education to the children of FM. The full team will return in the fall to continue to program for all the children. We welcome anyone who has an interest in participating to contact SHH. We will be hosting a fundraiser to support the fall trip which requires financial support to purchase medications and equipment. We also look forward to the release of the documentary by Sniffen Pictures this summer.
By Miriam Tuchman | President
By Miriam Tuchman | President, SHH
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