God is Good!

One morning when I arrived at clinic, I noticed that someone had changed the quote on the white board. I didn't really stop and read it till later in the morning.
"I will never give you more then you can handle. I will let you bend but will not let you break" -Jesus. Wow, just exactly what I needed right then. Isn't it amazing how God does that?

Some days, the stress in the amount of work we have to do is overwhelming. But I'm constantly reminded that God will give me the strength to do what I'm called to do here.
This week has been very stretching, tiring, and stressful. Every single day had it own set of difficulties.        

Monday was a long full day with seeing just over 130 people total.
Tuesday dawned bright an early, with lots of knocks on the gate. People who had cuts that needed to be stitched, laboring mothers and little sleep.
  Mali and I had a lady in labor. A 13 year old mom. Yep, you heard right. 13. Our hearts broke. She wasn't progressing very fast so we told them to call us if anything changed... and we went to bed. We had barely been sleeping when we heard the knock on the gate and we made our way to clinic, but she really hadn't changed. That night we made our way to clinic 4 times till the night was over. On one of the trips down, we where greeted with a huge group of people who had brought in another laboring mother. Due to the high risk in such young girls giving birth, we transferred out first laboring patient out to a bigger hospital. Just after Alex and Mali left for TG with her, we welcomed our 3rd laboring mother.  I wondered to myself how much more we really could take, and as evening started to near I started to worry about loosing my second nights sleep. Neither of the ladies seemed in a big hurry to have their baby's. Finally around 1:00am the urgent gate knock came. We hurried down to clinic to be welcomed with the wonderful sound of a baby crying! I was so happy!  We still had a lady in labor, who wasn't making any progress. In the morning, we started clinic, but it was soon decided that we needed to take our lady out to a bigger hospital. It wasn't long till Alex, Mali and I left for TG. Thankfully we made it out to town safely and transferred her to a bigger hospital.  We found out that the first girl we transferred out had a C-section and mom and baby are doing well. We are still waiting to hear what the rest of the story is on our 2nd transfer but we are praying that everything went well for her too!
  Please to continue to pray for us. Big decisions and nights without sleep are stressful. We NEED your help!

In HIS service -Mis Ellamae

"His hand is in every detail."

This morning we heard at devotions something that struck  me.

 "And if I could tell you all,you would see how God has done all,and I nothing. I(we) have worked hard,very hard. That is all;and I have never refused God anything."-Florence Nightingale

I watch my fellow nurses...I watch Hans...I watch Donny and Thea...I watch Janell...I watch Brandon...
Yes,we work hard. Very hard at times. Our minds and bodies are taxed(at times) and yet....it is God that is doing all. His hand is in every detail. I truly believe it. With all my  heart.

With Alyssa being gone...we missed her. (Not her work but her presence) I'm always shocked to see how evryone joins hands to carry the load. Ellamae has become a pro a prenatal consultations. Bravo! Kayla picked up my lose ends...Hans took care of all the controlling and helped Fré Dolph. I'm blessed. It did seem that....well...the babies all wanted to be born the end of April and beginning of May. I guess they wanted spring birthdays!!;) I believe I prayed away quite a few....desperate for a full nights sleep. (I did pray that whatever was best would regardless of my comfort)

Ellamae did great at her first delivery. Happy to be her teacher.😉

Kayla,Hans, and I had a bumpy ride out to Fonds de Blan....
After a crazy hike in the rain,Mis Marquise called me down to clinic for an emergency she said...a severely preeclampic woman in labour.  I had referred her to FDB,but she didn't take it seriously. So here she lay....in labour. With a sky high blood pressure. We administered the correct meds...changed from my wet hiking clothes and took off. The trail was nice and bumpy after tropic downpours. Hans did great. Kayla and I switched off holding the IV bag... it was 7pm by the time we got on the next bumpy leg of journey...her cries and moans got closer and between comforting her telling her to 'Pren Ké' take heart...I prayed...we all sighed a huge sigh when we pulled in the nicely lit,clean OB ward. The joy ,the relief of placing her in the have of very capable doctors.  I felt like I lost 50lbs right there. We feasted on Pringles as we drove back to Petit Gôave.

These little children never cease make my heart squeeze with joy. ... my little Plumpy Nut babies. He was such a grump...tiny...his skinny neck barely held his head up. Now....he's a little sweat heart. He lisps name and just kinda go "ahhhhhh"



He's a new patient...I can hardly wait to see him nice and chubby....

This is one brave little feller.... you see the size of those burns?????well....he didn't cry a tear. At one point he asked me in such calm,cool voice..."Mis Mali...ou preské fini??" (Are you almost done)  I bent down to look at him,"Does it hurt cheri? "  He gave me the cutest lopsided grin..."yah it does..." how can help but kiss such an cute little child??They are such day brightners...I cherish those moments.
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This is a day late....I've finally managed to load my pictures. Yay!!

...
Mis Mali

Real World Problems

   Haiti's healthcare situation is worse then it's been in a longtime. The largest state run hospitals in Port au Prince as well as at least half a dozen other government hospitals around the country have been on strike for several weeks. Last week a pregnant woman died in the street outside the gate of the general hospital in downtown Port au Prince because she was unable to find care inside.  The doctors and nurses are holding out for higher pay and asking to be provided with basic supplies and better working conditions. I can hardly blame them. There is nothing more frustrating for a healthcare worker then to know what care needs to be given to a patient yet be unable to provide it because of the lack of equipment or supplies. This situation has further complicated the already difficult process of transferring emergency cases out to a higher lever of care since this means that the hospitals run by international organizations are now even more overrun and beyond capacity then before due to the unavailability of the public hospitals.
  Yesterday afternoon an extremely hypertensive and preeclamptic woman in labor arrived at the clinic. We had been unsuccessful in getting her blood pressure sufficiently under control and had advised her a week before to go out to a hospital in Fond des Blancs that has lodging for high risk pregnancies and complete OB capabilities because of her preeclampsia. Unfortunately that didn't happen and now we had to get her somewhere where they would be able to do a C-section. Thanks to the strike Ti Goave hospital wasn't an option. Because of the excess rain throughout the last month sections of the road between here and port are covered in mud and traffic is absolutely horrible. Mali, Kayla and I ended up taking her the whole way to St Boniface hospital in Fond des Blancs. With the current rutted up roads this is a 3+ hour trip. Only about 45 minutes of that is on a paved road surface.  Thankfully we made it without incident and without the baby coming and transferred her into the hands of the capable hospital staff there.

Fre Daniel doing devotions in the morning before clinic opens

  With all the instability and problems this country is facing, it is a tremendous blessing that, thanks to all the people who help support the mission here, local  folks  can rely on our clinic to be there and provide what care we can give. Sometimes it can feel like  we aren't capable of doing very much here but the simple fact that we will do whatever we can do no matter what or when the problem is brought in has been an incredible witness to the people of this country.
  We Americans like to criticize our own healthcare system, which no doubt does have its own set of very real problems. Today, however, I would like you to take a moment to thank God for  your hospitals as well as your government for all the good that they do. There is a huge amount we take for granted.  Please keep Haiti in your prayers as well. The current interim government has not been paying its bills and we very well could be heading towards a major fuel and consumable goods shortage.
   The following are some pics of a boy who was brought in with some major burns last week. Thanks to the care of our dedicated nurses he is quickly starting to heal.

This fellow had hot cooking water spilled on him

Bandaging up this brave little guy

All ready to go!