St. John nurse gets hard look at devastation in Haiti
By Cheryll A. Borgaard / The Daily News | Posted: Friday, February 19, 2010 11:15 pm |
Courtesy of Matt Luce Matt Luce, an Emergency Room nurse at St. John Medical Center, treats a patient in Haiti during his recent two-week stay in the ravaged country.
When Matt Luce arrived in Haiti two weeks ago, he thought he'd be treating people with wounds from the devastating earthquake. That was not the case.
"It wasn't trauma like I thought it would be — it's the absolute poverty," he said Friday. "It's skin diseases, fungal infections, respiratory problems, dehydration and starvation. I didn't think I'd see that, but they're dying of starvation."
Luce, 26, an Emergency Department nurse at St. John Medical Center, traveled to the impoverished Caribbean country with Project Helping Hands, a humanitarian effort of teams of volunteers, both medical and non-medical. Luce's 20-member team included two doctors, a pediatrician, a pharmacist, physician assistants and nurses, half of them from Washington and Oregon.
The team flew into the Dominican Republic, Haiti's neighbor to the east. It was a 12-hour drive from Santiago to Port-au-Prince. The difference between the two countries was "night and day," Luce said.
"The Dominican Republic has good infrastructure," he said. "You cross the border and it's a different world. It's different language, there are tanks and humvees and helicopters and Haitian police riding in their pick-ups with shotguns in their hands. Ninety percent of the buildings and homes were pancaked, and there was rubble everywhere. It was like a war zone."
Luce and his group quickly set up a makeshift clinic away from downtown in an area where there hadn't been much relief effort yet. Ten Haitian interpreters helped the medical team, without pay. "They wanted to help out their fellow Haitians."
He said the medical team found they were treating more than wounds or disease.
"We're not about numbers or getting as many (patients) through as we can," he said. "We sat and talked. Post-traumatic stress disorder and depression was the number-one issue besides starvation. Every single person I saw and treated had lost a loved one. Sometimes they just needed to talk."
Luce said there are three faces that especially haunt him — a young mother, who had lost her husband in the earthquake, and her two children. The three of them were living on the street with just one blanket.
"She was my age and she had two girls, 2 and 4. She was absolute skin and bones and she looked dead behind her eyes, just holding her kids," he said. "She lost her husband, who was her provider, she lost her home. The little food she got, she gave to her daughters. I gave her my lunch and talked with her for a while. They're probably all three going to die, if they're not dead yet. I can't get their faces out of my head."
The work days were long — sunrise to sunset — and hot, 90 to 95 degrees, Luce said, The team treated about 300 patients a day. They needed to be back at their safe compound by dark because the prison had collapsed in the earthquake and 5,000 prisoners were on the street, not to mention roving gangs and thugs preying on the weak, he said.
They saw only one food distribution operation, he said, despite driving around the city "a lot." In order to get food, the people would have to get a ticket from the United Nations or from the Marines there. Sometimes what food was distributed wasn't always practical, he said.
"They were giving out rice in 150-pound bags and those starving, dehydrated women can't make it back to their tents or whatever shelter," he said. "So, she either pours it out on the ground because she can't carry it, or some strong male will grab it from her to sell it for ridiculously inflated prices."
Luce said the few remaining buildings or houses are largely unoccupied, meaning nearly everyone is living outside in makeshift tents of tarps or thin sheets. Aftershocks are still hitting the area, and some of the buildings could come down "if a brisk wind hits them," he said.
Luce said having so many people living unsheltered will be particularly disastrous in two weeks when the rainy season starts.
"When the rains come, you're going to see typhoid, cholera, malaria, and that's on top of the horrid conditions of rivers of garbage and sewage already causing health problems," he said. "I truly believe more people will die during the rainy season than the earthquake itself."
Despite all the poverty, the seemingly hopelessness of their living conditions, the Haitians "are some of the most resilient people I've ever met," he said. "While we were there, they had three days of national mourning instead of Mardi Gras. There were sad songs, but also joyful songs, even at 2 a.m. There was no religion - voodoo, Islamic or Christian. The three days was a way of them coming together and through it."
Luce, who had to raise all the money for his travel expenses, thanks his co-workers at St. John and from Lower Columbia Eye Clinic for donations.
"I'm lucky to work where I do," he said. "My manager and director got on board at minute-one. And the staff I work with are incredible."
So, does Luce think he made a difference during his two weeks in Haiti?
"We made a difference to those we came in contact with," he said. "It might be not even a drop in the bucket, but we made a difference in the 1,500 people we saw."
Before he left Haiti, Luce said he asked his interpreter, Kishmir, "What should we do?"
"And he said, 'Tell our story.' "