The Return Of The 15 Hour Work Day

As I awoke at 4am in a kiddie pool of sweat, I thought how peaceful the air was. Knowing we had more than a day's worth of cases, I decided to shower before the other's did...and I figured a 4am start was pretty good. After Uno downed her oatmeal, Chalupa drank her coffee, Pat had his prunes, and of course Paige staring aimlessly at the wall, J.Bice, Adam, and myself begin preparing the supplies and instrumentation for the first cases of the day. Jeannie (Dr. Dietrich's wife) plays conductor, and orchestrates the patient flow. On tap first, a cast & pin removal on a very sweet 3 yr old boy. Then another cast removal & straightening out of a club foot on a 5 year old girl (club foot is essentially where the foot turns 90 degrees sideways inward, so basically you'd be walking on the outside of your foot). Again, it's amazing how a gentle hand, exam glove balloon, and a little stuffed animal can put a child at ease. This little girl was an absolute sweetheart. She clung onto J.Bice like Pat with tofu. After the removal of an antibiotic spacer on a 13 year old boy, and a quick knee scope, what proved to be the longest case of the day began...

With the proper implants, and more importantly, the proper instrumentation, an ankle fusion can be pretty straight forward. Did I mention the part about proper instrumentation? Yeah, here's where "rolling with the punches" really fits. When you're in someone else's house, you may not like their silverware, or their couch, or even the television for that matter...so is it in a third world country. From crutial screwdrivers which are manufacturer specific, to operating room tables (or lack there of)...missing instrumentation, missing medication "...ummm, what's the dosage of ketamine again?!?...", to patient x-rays, and whenthe last time this patient ate...

What I'm trying to get at, is that we come here to supplement the local staff already here. None of us comes in, starts changing things around to do it "our way"...we work hand in hand with the Haitian staff...not against them. They do things differently...many things differently; we adapt, make it work for the patient's benefit...because sometimes, you just have to roll with the punches. I'll let you know right now, I typed up the first 2/3 of this entry a few days ago...falling asleep at the laptop...the power goes out...patient is already in the room...gotta go to the bathroom...put on dry scrubs...power goes out (again)...remove a cast...pull some pins...beans and rice (again)...oh, was that the power that just went out, hmmm...bummer. It has been anything but easy, to sit down and update our little blog here...and we apologize.

So as you all read this blog, keep this in mind: we've been exhausted every single day; our bodies literally ache; we're tired, hungry, and thirsty...but it's not about us...it's about the people of Haiti who surround us...we're here to help...we do what we can. We enter this country, and we adapt...we greet each day with optimism...because, often times in life...you just need to roll with the punches...this is Haiti people...it's not an ideal scenario here. These men and women need our help, the children need our help...they need our smiles; so we adapt, we make it work, we do what we can...because when you need to make a smoothie without a blender...or do 20 cases in two days...you just have to roll with the punches.