Day 5

Today is La Fete du Drapeau (Flag Day) in Haiti. I did a bit of research on it. The holiday dates back to 1803. The original Haitian flag reflected that of the French. However, once the rebel army won, they tore up the flag such that only the red and blue stripes remained; this was symbolic of the Haitians overthrowing the colonialist, pro-slavery French. The flag was visible everywhere today. They transferred most of the ER/ICU patients to the other part of the hospital in anticipation of a lot of trauma. It was actually a bit slow most of the day. I fear that the evening/night shift will be crazy!

We went to the orphanage this morning. Our first stop was the library where a bunch of kids sang the national anthem for us, it was so cute. They were marching in place and waving little flags. A lot of these kids have special needs and will remain at this house...they will not be adopted. The property that the orphanage is on is huge. Most of the staff lives in tents but they are in the process of building a new dorm for the kids and staff. During this visit, we had a long chat with the pediatrician who works there. His English was a bit rusty so he asked me to translate his French. I was amazed that I was able to understand most of what he was saying; my translation on the other hand was not so great. I definitely could not be an interpreter. Many Haitians faces light up when they realize I speak French. Many Haitians can understand French but not all of them can speak it. I have not used my French in about 10 years so it's nice to be able to fumble through my verb conjugations.

Today was a great day for our 80-something lady with the left sided pneumonia vs. pleural effusion. They almost did a thoracentesis last night but apparently a family member was unsure about the procedure. I have learned that the Haitian people are fine with IVs and blood draws but when it comes to a thoracentesis or paracentesis, it's a little bit more controversial from a cultural/religion standpoint. The family members have to be notified and educated before these kinds of procedures, otherwise there can be a lot of drama. However, after 3+ days of discussing that she needed the procedure, not necessarily for diagnosis, but for palliative reasons, we used the one kit we had to do it. It was great...neither of the Haitian docs had done one before, so they did it together with one of our docs. I was holding this poor frail lady upright and she was not responding to any painful stimuli. About midway through pulling off the almost 1.4 L of fluid, she began to wake up and look around. She looks so much more comfortable and she no longer needs oxygen. Yay! I think it was great for the staff and the patient's family to see that successful outcome.

I am going to mass again tomorrow morning. Thursdays are typically the day they bury the dead so it should be quite a cultural experience. I am going to work the evening shift tomorrow to get a little bit of a different experience.