Wheelchairs

I managed to get two wheelchairs and was able to go last week and give them out.  The wheelchairs came  from the Swiss paraplegic foundation who sent in a container of 250 chairs to a hospital just outside of Cap Haitian and the chairs have been distributed around different physiotherapists. I managed to get two off a physiotherapist.

The first went to Mano a 15 year old with Cerebral Palsy.  Mano can walk a few metres unaided but it is really difficult for him.  He hasn't really left his house in a few years.

The other went to Alynx, a ten year old with microcephaly.  He loves sitting outside his house watching everyone and hanging out.  He was sitting on a wooden chair with a pole across the front to make sure he doesn't fall out.  Now he will be able to sit somewhere more comfortable and go out.  He lives very close to the clinic so once I start working someone can bring him over for physio once a week.

He was very happy to get his chair!! I couldn't find a child's chair but this is better than nothing.

Both boys were patients of mine when I was in Haiti before and I had to go to their houses to treat them hopefully now they will be able to come to the clinic for physio and with better facilities we should be able to do more.

The boys

People are always asking how the boys are so here you go....

Sam has taken a while to settle in to life in Haiti, he loves where we live and being able to play outside.   He never complains he is too hot and insists on wearing his PJ's and using a blanket at night time.  Being out in the community and going to church is a bit overwhelming for him, everything is so loud (especially church) and when he is in the street with me people are staring or shouting at him and the kids are all trying to touch him which he doesn't like but he is coming round and getting more and more comfortable everyday.

He loves saying 'Koman ou ye?' (how are you in Creole) to people he knows and is starting to say a few more things in Creole.  Sam's favourite things to do are go swimming, play outside with Lily & Sofie, visit friends houses who have kids to play with and play (torture) Bello Bello.......his kitten!

One thing which I appreciate here with Sam is the opportunity to teach him.  We had a young girl in the clinic who is 25 and pregnant with her 6th child. She is on her own, her mother is dead and her father threw her out of the house.  Anyway  I was explaining to Sam I was going to collect up some of his and Joel's clothes and give them to a little boy who didn't have any clothes. Our conversation went like this.....

M - Sam, I am going to give some of your clothes to a little boy who doesn't have any.
S - I don't want to give my clothes away!
M - How would you feel if you didn't have any clothes?
S - I would be sad, I am going to give that little boy some of my clothes.
M- Sam, that's very kind.
S - I am going to give that little boy some of my books too.
M - ok Sam
S - Can I give that little boy some of my toys too?
M - Sam you know if you give some toys away you can't get them back.
S - Ok I am going to give that little boy some of my toys and he will be really happy.
M -  Sam, that is very kind of you.

So he collected up his clothes, a couple of books and some toys and put them in a bag to give to this little boy and told me ' I am really happy that little boy is going to be happy.'
We went later that day to give the bag to Dr Rodney in the clinic who was going to pass on the stuff to the young girl.  Sam kept asking about the bag, when we were going to give it to Dr Rodney and he was very concerned that it went to the right person. He told me lots of times that little boy will be really happy.  Even for a few days after he was talking about it.  He also hasn't asked for any of the toys he gave away ( He doesn't forget anything so I thought he might ask for them one day!!).

  It was really lovely amidst the temper tantrums (they don't call it terrible twos for no reason!!) to see a different side of him and to see him thinking about other people and realising the world doesn't revolve around him. Also to see that he was valuing how that little boy would feel more than his clothes, toys and books which we know are very important when your 2!!

There are lots of obvious opportunities here to teach him about sharing, about helping other people and about being thankful for all the things God has given to us.

I told him last week Granny is coming to visit our new home and he has been asking about it everyday! He wants to know when Granny is coming on the big plane.  We are very thankful for facetime  and anytime Sam wants to talk to his granny we can just phone her.

Poor Joel hasn't been well for just over 2 weeks now, he is much better than what he was but still not 100 %.  He is still got a runny nose and cough but is in much better form and almost back to his very smiley self.  He loves anybody talking to him, or if you just talk near him he smiles!  He is wanting to get into everything but hasn't quite worked out how to crawl yet.  He loves watching Sam play but that may be a different story once he starts to move! He is still growing quickly and weighs 21 lbs!! Needless to say I don't carry him around a lot and I am looking forward to him crawling.

My favourite time with the boys is bath time and story time! Every night they are in the bath together and they love it then we go into Sam's room for a story, it s funny to see Joel sitting up watching the book at only 7  months old!

impossible to get them all to look at the camera at the same time.....I am hoping this will improve with age!

Photobombed by Pepper & Boone

EBS

EBS classes started back on 22nd August with the first round of intensives from visiting professors.  An intensive course usually lasts for two weeks with class from 8 - 12 everyday.  Bill taught one of these courses in 2013 and his students are now in 4th year.  He was surprised to see that his students remembered him.

Here is our first round of intensives....

This Saturday four more VP's join us for the next two weeks of intensives.  Then on 19th September residential courses will begin and  Bill will start teaching (he had initially thought he would be teaching an intensive).  This semester he will be teaching three courses, systematic theology, OT wisdom literature and the general epistles.  His days are spent in his office preparing and continuing with language.  Bill's Creole teacher has challenged him to write his power point slides for class in Creole which seems to be going well. He is really looking forward to starting teaching.

The latest edition to our house is a wee cat which Sam has decided to call 'bello bello' . Sam loves bello (a bit too much) he loves playing with him and carrying  him around and poor wee bello bello has been very patient!!

Fev - mobile clinic

On Saturday our NI team along with a team from the clinic headed to Fev to do a mobile clinic.  The church at Fev has been there for just over a year and the pastor is a graduate of EBS. The church and surrounding field was set up for the clinic, basically we went wherever there was shade!!

Pastor Walnique had been in Fev the day before giving out tickets for the clinic which made the morning very smooth.  We had various stations, dossier, BP, consultations, Lab, Pharmacy and evangelism / prayer station.

Were we able to see over 200 patients who probably wouldn't have otherwise been to see a doctor.  The day started with some education sessions.  We brought  a team of people from our HIV clinic, one of the nurses explained what HIV was, how you can get it, how it can be treated and how you can protect yourself.  At the end of her talk she asked how many people had never heard of HIV / AIDS,   I was shocked to see many of the patients put their hand up. Dr Rodney then did a session on cholera, he finished his session with the question ' How can you protect yourself against chlolera?'  again I was shocked to see only a few people knew the answer to this.  Fev is only a 15 minute drive from the seminary, its not way out in the country or way up in the mountains yet there was a huge lack in knowledge about medical care.

 Bethany was taking blood pressure for older people and she thinks over 90 % of them had high blood pressure putting them at a huge risk for a stroke. The highest she found was in an old man whose BP was 290 / 220 (If you don't know the average is 120 / 80).  A lot of this is diet related as Haitian's cook with lots of oil and lots of salt.  Most of these people didn't know they had a problem with blood pressure.  We were only able to give them a month's supply of medication but they were advised to continue to attend a clinic to control their blood pressure, however this is difficult for many people as they simply cannot afford to go the doctor every month.

The lab team were carrying out HIV tests for whoever wanted them.  If anyone was found to have a positive result they would be told to come to our HIV clinic at Bethesda where they can get treatment for free.

Our NI team worked alongside Pastor Walnique praying and sharing the gospel with the patients, we were able to pray with a lot of people who were already Christians.  We also got the opportunity to pray with 3 people who wanted to accept Jesus as their Saviour.  One of the ladies explained she understood the gospel and was ready to ask Jesus to forgive her, her husband then came over and said he would also like to become a christian.  We shared with another lady and at the end of the conversation she wanted to accept Jesus as her Saviour.

A few more stories from the day.....

Lewis & I spoke with a man called Joseph, he lives with his girlfriend and they have nine children together. We were able to explain the gospel to him, he knew some things about the Bible but not a lot.  He told us he wants to be saved but he runs a lottery business and if he becomes a christian he cannot do that job anymore. If he has no work he doesn't know how he will provide for his family. We prayed with him and as we were praying  he was wiping the tears away from his eyes.

Another lady we met also said she would like to become a Christian but her husband is a witch doctor and if she did he would throw her out.  She would be alone with no one to provide for her.

A few people said they want to accept Jesus but they are not ready yet.  There is something in their lives which is stopping them.  All we could do was to explain that the bible says come to God the way you are, you don't need to sort your life out first.

It was eye opening for us to see and hear the struggles people have.  It seems many people are open to talking about God, they want to become Christians but most of them feel they need to get themselves ready before they can come before God to ask for forgiveness. Thankfully this is not what the bible teaches.  If it was it would never happen, we would never be good enough to have a relationship with God.  It is only through the saving work of Jesus Christ on the cross that we can have our sins forgiven.  And the bible  tells us today is the day to come to God and to come the way we are.  We don't have to get ourselves ready.

Here in Haiti life is hard, in more ways than we will probably know.  But for those who put their trust in Jesus,  they can look forward to their hope, which is in heaven,  where there will be no more crying, no more death, no more suffering and no more pain.  That is the good news we were in Fev  to share with people.

At first glance this it looks like this little boy is playing with a balloon.........However we were running an HIV clinic and teaching people how to protect themselves......I'll let you figure out what it is!!

Northern Ireland team

Our Northern Ireland team have been here for almost a week and have been busy painting here at EBS.  Phil's plan is to repaint all the buildings different colours so they look more Haitian using Caribbean colours.  Our team has completed the library and it lovely.

They have also been touring the OMS ministries here and we spent some time listening to Dr Rodney's testimony, visiting the clinic, radio station and meeting with the every community for Christ church leaders.

On Thursday afternoon we spent the whole afternoon counting and bagging tablets for a mobile clinic we are doing tomorrow in a zone called Fev.

 Here is some more info about Fev....

http://mshaiti.blogspot.co.uk/2015/10/not-finished-fev.html

http://mshaiti.blogspot.co.uk/2015/12/not-awesome.html

We hope to see 150 - 200 patients tomorrow........please pray for the team for both physical and spiritual healing tomorrow.  Will let you know how it goes.

Why Physiotherapy?

I have been working on organising  a group/ network in the north of Haiti for anyone involved in PT and I was thinking well why should physiotherapy be so important in Haiti? Surely there are much bigger problems in Haiti how will PT help anything??

The reason I wanted to be a Physiotherapist was because I wanted to do something medical but not medicine, so PT was the next best thing. I have worked in Haiti and I have worked in the NHS (in Northern Ireland) and often working in the NHS is frustrating. Patients don't do their exercises and then don't get better and then decide physio doesn't work. (this is a generalisation you do find some people who do what you ask!!)

I had a completely different experience in Haiti, I found very simple things worked very well. One of my first patients was an older man with arthritis in both knees, he was struggling to walk and was holding onto his wife in order to walk. I gave him some very very simple exercises to strengthen the muscles around his knees and told him to do them 3 times a day, everyday and come back in two weeks. I almost couldn't believe when he walked in two weeks later, unaided, a lot faster and visibly in much less pain. When I asked him how he felt he said the pain had gone and he was able to walk much better. Without the physio the scenario would have been go to the doctor to start on pain medication (which you have to pay for every time!), his joints would have got stiffer and stiffer making walking more difficult until eventually he couldn't weight bear anymore. Living like that is difficult in our culture, in Haiti its 1000 times harder.

Due to the lack of education in Haiti, especially health education the Haitian mindset is, if you are feeling sore,  or you have hurt yourself, or you have had a stroke you stay at home, often in bed until you get better.  This is the complete opposite to what PT does.

Imagine you live in Haiti and you fall and hurt your back and you work in construction.  You can't go to work and there is no sick pay from your employer or the government. After a while  you will probably lose your job, you also won't get any better making it impossible to work anyway. You will have also spent a lot of money going to different doctors and clinics, perhaps even a witch doctor to try to get better so now your at home, with back pain and no job and no money.

So how can PT really help people in Haiti?

I think the most important way is education, education regarding what PT does and how it can help.  Trying to change the mindset of staying in bed when you are sore or if you have had a stroke. Using exercise and rehab to regain function so people can work. Not only for work but for general life, most people have to walk to collect clean water for their house, they cook everything outside, cooking  from scratch, they wash all their clothes by hand, there is no electricity at home and you have to go to the market almost everyday for anything fresh.   Imagine trying to live like that if you have had a stroke which hasn't been treated or you suffer from back  or knee pain.

Another big area where PT is really needed is in paediatrics. Children with Cerebral palsy and other physical problems are kept at home often in bed, they develop contractures in their joints making it very difficult for parents to wash, dress and toilet them. PT aims to gives these children the best quality of life and reach their full potential. We also teach their parents how to best look after them. If we can we will also try to find a wheelchair so these children don't have to be indoors all the time which helps take away the stigma associated with children who have special needs.

Your probably thinking I have left out the obvious what about actual PT treatment which of course can help, especially when patients do what you ask them to do. Also being able to give out equipment such as crutches, walking sticks and wheelchairs can help a lot.

So I feel having PT services in Haiti can really help Haitian people who need those services.

I recently met with a Haitian PT who has no formal training but has been doing some PT in Haiti for about 20 years! Which I was really shocked at as it seemed when I was first here in 2008 no one knew was PT was. It was good to meet with her and see what has been going on and she has lots of contacts who we can invite to the first meeting of the group. Now I have to set up a meeting, work on a name and clear objectives for the group / network.

In other news........we have a small team from home here at the seminary this week. Its so nice to hear some Northern Irish accents again! They have been painting here at the seminary and visiting OMS ministries. One of the girls is a midwife and was at the ante natal clinic in the Bethesda today. Tomorrow we will be going to an ECC meeting to meet the pastors involved in church planting and spend the afternoon counting pills preparing for a mobile clinic which we will do on Saturday in an area called Fev.  Our seminary students have been working in Fev for over a year, one of the graduates is the pastor of the church plant there.  There is no clinic in their zone and we will also be doing some evangelising and praying with people from the village.

Physiotherapy / Physical Therapy / PT

Heads up first..........for easiness sake I am going to start calling physiotherapy / physical therapy PT that way it doesn't matter which country you are from when reading this!!

When I first came to Haiti in 2008 there was no PT at all here, Gavin used to joke I was the best PT in the north of Haiti mainly because I was the only one!!In 2010 there were a lot more visiting PT's because of the earthquake and it seems since then there is a lot more awareness of what PT is and how it can help people.

Haiti now has a Haitian Physical Therapy Association however from what I can find there are only around 35 members serving a population of about 12 million people. Most of these have people have trained outside of Haiti and have come back to work here. Now Haitian's are able to study physiotherapy in their own country for the first time in a University in Leogane.  Since I have been in Haiti I have been trying to talk to other people who are involved in PT in and around Cap Haitian. Just down the road from us is a physiotherapy technician school where students can go and study for 2 years to become a PT tech. They will have 40 students graduate this year.

It seems there is a lot more PT going on since 2010, however most of those who are working are PT techs. I am currently working on starting a PT network in the North of Haiti and the idea behind this is to improve communications between PT's, to create a referral system, to increase knowledge and skills through education sessions and to make best use of equipment which is sent down to Haiti. For me this will involve meeting with other PT's and clinic's in the area. I hope to eventually set up a meeting and invite anyone who is working or qualified as a PT / PT tech to discuss what exactly this will look like in Haiti.

In Bethesda we hope to build a purpose built room  physiotherapy department. Over the next two years  I plan to work with someone, probably be a local PT technician who I can train up and can take over the PT service at Bethesda. Dr Rodney feels it is important for Bethesda to offer this service long term. However we do need some extra funding for the building and if you would like to donate to this please get in touch with me.

The old PT room, just a bit of space with a few beds which is now used as an emergency room

For any physio's reading this who have any ideas or want to be involved I would love some input as to what you think is essential for a physio 'department'. I will be pretty much treating anything and everything joint pain, back pain, strokes, CP, amputees, fractures etc. Or if you think there would be a possibility of setting up some sort of partnership between your place of work and Bethesda then get in touch, I would love to explore those possibilities.