Who delivered your baby? Was it me ?

August 1

We had a meeting with the Matrons today who came together for their monthly reunion at the beginning of each month. They came together—both men and women— for this meeting. Matrons is the essential Haitian-Creole term for “Midwife.” These women and men were packed into this meeting room. At the beginning of each month, they are given additional supplied and 50 Gourdes (Haitian currency) for the needs. The 50 Gourdes and the additional supplies are also given by HAS. These Matrons or Matwons stay until the end of the meeting for the supplies. Some of which have been Matwons for decades. They seem to have part-time jobs on the side to supplement. As I gazed across the room, I saw young matwons who beamed with youth and old matwons who seemed so tired. The young matwons—as I later found out—delivered 9 children in the community. For her business was booming. Some delivered so many babies that they forgot their names of their clients and their children. As for the others, not so much. Maybe the busy matwons decided that it was a waste of their time. Regardless of this, I saw a new trend of fashion amongst the matwons: the church hat aesthetic. The women in the room had their church hats titled to the side, setting the trend for all of Haiti. They were a quite interesting group of individuals. I was most impressed by how passionate and humble they were when they received their items. Their meeting began with a prayer and a song of praise. These matwons meant business because they sat so seriously and listened intently! When asked to over their steps of how they deliver a baby: they stood up and went through step by step. When their peers heard something “out of the ordinary,” they stopped and said “Ki sa?” meaning “What?” Their peers were quality control. When the meeting coordinator pulled me talked to me to the side to ask them if their was anything that she need to mention in the meeting (that I felt should be mentioned) I told her my concerns. As my research comes to a close, I have been seeing a lot of neonatal cases with children who have infected umbilical cords, conjunctivitis, fever, and jaundice. All of which are preventable— some by the matwons and some not. Their area of concern should be the infected umbilical cords. There is a large percent of these deliveries that are being done at the homes of these mothers. There should be no reason or excuse as to why these umbilical cords are being infected. I could feel the room tense up when I told them that I have access to information about who are delivering these children. Part of my research is going to the root of the problem and addressing it. We need to be quality control for each other. We need to check the information of each other.

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When you get a new language down-pact.

JULY 22

I feel like I have mastered the language of Diabetes. To offer adequate services in translation, I needed to learn the language of Diabetes because of the huge amount of diabetes patients that she has. I spent one day away from the hospital and a couple of patients who came back were looking for me. I almost thought that something was wrong because they were looking for me. But then I remembered that I was translating for them the other day. They were so happy to see me as I walked through the hospital looking for Dr. Close. Being away for a day, it felt different being back after such a long time.

Important to shadowing Dr. Close was being able to speak the language of Diabetes. I have never taken insulin, but now I know what it means to take a 25 in the morning and a 15 at night. I know the questions to ask a diabetes patient to make sure that their insulin/ medication is working. The line of questioning has become a second nature to me. At first I was getting tripped up with all the numbers in creole, but when I pulled out my notebook and wrote down everything the patient said, it seemed like the patients opened up more about the experience with diabetes. The patients speak so fast when they talk about insulin! Also, I had to build my creole medicinal vocabulary because it was crucial. Certain questions about does the medicine gives you headache? Or does it make you go to the bathroom often— I knew. I always reminded the patients to moisturize and lotion they feet to avoid infection each night. Dr. Close gave me the lotion and I knew what to say.

All we need to do is walk

Now today was the first day of my work with Dr. Close. Doctor Close is no joke. See the other day, I was sitting down catching up on my blog and she needed help with her internet stick. She didn’t come to see me though. She came to visit a medical student whom she knew from way back in the day. She called me over to help saying “You are young, you know these kinds of things.” I spoke creole with the Pierre, a medical student, who comes to help on the weekends about the internet stick. Dr. Close’s eyes lit up ! She asked me if I speak Creole, I hesitantly said yes. And before you know it, I was engaged to provide my translation services for her. What did I do? I know what I did. I was going to be doing some translation services for Dr. Close. Dr. Close created the Diabetes Clinic for Hospital Albert Schweitzer and has been coming here ever since. She is no stranger to HAS ! She see over 60 patients a day, 80 even. Translation is such beautiful thing because I became the voice of medicine and the voice of the patient. I could feel my voice as a translator growing after time passed. What ever a patient felt, I had to vocalize it. Whatever the doctor suggested, I had to amplify it. I had to ask the tough questions and get difficult answers.

For instance, we had a patient who had a stroke in America, came back home to Haiti with a stomach that was rock hard. She could barely talk and was in great pain. Her children could not figure out what happened to her. My job was to figure out what happened to her and find out more information regarding when and where the stroke took place and determine what happened to her between the time she left America and returned back to Haiti. Her family was so concerned about her well-being was dedicated to guarding her health.

Some patients came to hospital for malnutrition, looking for something to eat. There is no food for them at the hospital either. These patients are hungry and often come back in weeks looking for more food. Access to medication is not easy for patients with HIV, finding that even if they have medication, sometimes only the first forty patients will be seen to be given access to refills for this medication. These HIV patients have little to no access to ARVs, the medication needed to help the size of the red blood cells. Specifically, this patient has HIV and suffers from Anemia. Double whammy. Anemia is manageable sickness in the US, but in Haiti, it is not. Not only does this patient have to chase after medicine for HIV, they need to find medicine for their anemia.

Another patient was bed stricken with typhoid fever and the only thing that could alleviate the pain was the him walking and allowing himself to move throughout the hospital. There was nothing else that he could do. I told him to do as the doctor advised. Sure enough, on my out of the hospital, I saw him walking around the hospital with his mother. Trying.

All we have to do is try. All we have to do it walk. No matter how hard or how difficult. We have to make a way through.

Post de Sante

July 14, 2016

Today we went to one of the “Post de Sante,” which is a mixture of a mobile clinic and an information site for members of the community. These clinics take the form of a pop-up sites that are located every-single day of the week throughout the community because the health centers are not easily accessible by everything. These mobile clinics are ran by nurses who are at the top of their field. Members of the community can receive their vaccines and their emergency needs are well met.

I showed up a site in near-by Deschapelles and went to work. I did not know whether to wear my scrubs or not, but I showed up with them anyways. While the mobile clinic was being ran by the nurse, I quickly joined two community health care workers who were in charge of passing out vitamins, food supplements, providing vaccines, and guarding the nutrition of children in the community. Needless to say: Multi-tasking was the name of the game. Each mother sat patiently cradling their child regardless of their age. The make-shit waiting room beamed with chatter, laughter, and tad-bit of crying. Placed underneath a decent amount of shade, additional benches were added because today was a busy day. Mothers handed their child’s nutrition card—some tattered and some new. These mothers knew that it was their job to protect their child regardless of how much or how little that they had. I gazed at the waiting room and saw some skinny children and some chubby-well-fed-children. Regardless of the spectrum at which they fell, their mothers were here to guard the nutrition of their child. These women and the extent to which they were concerned about their children inspired me.

When enough children came, you can feel task at hand become the focal point: weighing them. These mothers were no stranger to the process: take my child’s clothes off, place their little legs in the weighing sack, and put them in line to weighed. I let the community health care worker do the first couple of patients, learned the lay of the land, and quickly began to weigh these children! Calling each name, and the child to be next in line, order was created from such chaos. The lesson spent in French understanding how to say numbers accurately came into play immensely. I said the number and wrote it down in their nutrition chart— a chart that mothers can visually understand the progression or digression of their child’s health. I believe in that time only, I weighed about 30 babies. And that was just the FIRST wave!

The first wave got their education on the importance of nutrition. They were lectured by Community Health Care worker Figueroa (who has been a staple in the community for over 35 years). After a day of work he explained to me that he has been doing this work and he is no stranger to his community. He loves his work because of the love that his community has for him. Regardless of this love, he showed those mothers tough love for sake of his nutrition lecture. I would like to think that what he was saying resonated with the women. I would like to think that between their children distracting them, something was said that made them reflect. Sad to say, but only the first wave received their nutrition lecture because the second wave always comes late to avoid it.

Sure enough, those latecomers started strolling on in. They even started strolling in during the nutrition lecture turning in their child’s nutrition chart. Crazy right? So distracting. Imagine coming in the class late and turning in your homework while your professor was on the board teaching?

Regardless, even more children came during this second wave and I would like to count them at around 40. After being weighed, the circumference of the their arms was measured against the length of the arm and analyzed by looking at the strip’s notation of red, yellow, or green. After which, vitamins were passed and supplements were given to the malnourished children.

Towards the end of the day,  we waited to see if more mothers would come and I was able to witness a Post-Natal Home Survey that was done at the “Post-Sante.” This is technically not against the rules, but it had to be done. After a month of inputting the responses from the survey, it was a wonderful experience to see one done. Mothers are asked these intimate questions and their child is inspected. How convenient it is to have access to the mobile clinic after completing a survey ? Very. I hope that mother got all the help she needed. And I hope that the work I did made a difference in these children’s lives.

When the possibilities are actually endless..

When I first received my project from Rachel, or project coordinator from HAS, she said, “You can make this project as big or as small that you want it to be.” These words have echoed in my air every time I seek to start up my laptop. Here is picture of me at my office desk:

My office space, like my project will not be confined— it being as wide or as small as I want it to be.

I never believed in boundaries because they have to be set. In terms of a dream or goal, I believe that they sky is always the limit. There is power in determining your future and clarifying the details of your “limitations.” I have always been asked the question about what pushes me, or motivates me? This question always stumps because I never know what to say. It seems like when the question is asked, the secret of the world is trying to be discovered. Overall, what pushes me is my desire to transcend beyond the boundaries that is placed upon me. I never want to feel sad or misplaced because of the circumstances that have inflicted upon me. I seek to rise above and soar over. This statement is easier said then down because I often experience so much pushback in doing-so. The real test of persistence is when the “push-back” occurs. What about my pushback? That is the real question. I might sit at my desk, but I know that my work transcends beyond any four walls because I can make this project as big or as small that I want it to be. My “push-back” is my product. The stuff that is occurs after the equal sign. Like folks say back home “The proof is in the pudding.” In time, my pushback is in the pudding. I know everything that I am saying may seem cryptic— it should be. Currently, I am still working on the details and ironing out the kinks.

When I see my desk in the SCI center, I am happy. I have nice fan that blows cool air over the warm air that often evades into the corners the SCI center. Often times, a lot of community members stop by desk thinking that I am the one that has the answer to their question. I wish I had the answer to their question, but I do not.