Sunday, May 18, 2014

Weeds and deeds

Bon nwit, zanmi yo.  As promised in my last blog, I will write a little about datura stratmonium, also known as jimson weed, and other neurotoxins called tetrodotoxins, used in the process of zombification.  Wade Davis, in his book The Serpent and the Rainbow, cites the case of the famous zombie, Clairius Narcisse.  
Clairius on his way to his not so final resting place
Mr. Narcisse, born in 1922, was not well-loved in his community; along with being a womanizer, having children with at least 5 different women, he also was involved in a nasty land ownership dispute with his brother.  He quickly and mysteriously took sick and was declared dead by 3 well-respected doctors from the Albert Schweitzer Hospital here, and buried on May 2, 1962.  He appeared back in his village 18 years later, much to the surprise of his family and neighbors, who all recognized him at once.  Apparently someone (his brother?) had hired a bokor, or vodou priest, to make a mixture of human bones, plants with stinging spines and the bacteria that is commonly found on a pufferfish (watch out, sushi lovers). This mixture was secretly applied to a skin abrasion of his, inducing a coma which mimicked death.  A few days later he was exhumed and force fed a mixture of datura, cane syrup and sweet potato which made him loose his memory and hallucinate.  The regular ingestion of this formula kept him compliant while he worked in the cane fields.  When his master suddenly died after 2 years, Clairius was free to roam the countryside, which he did for 16 years, until the effects of datura faded enough for him discover that his brother had died and eventually find his way home.

Now and then I pass a group of blank-faced field workers in black rubber boots and hoes in hand, all working robotically in a row under the blazing hot sun.

meetings, meetings, meetings
My final week here in Haiti found me transversing the country - I should work for the highway dept here and file a report - 5 of us took motos and a jeep for 11 hours from Anse-a-Pitres to Jacmel to meet with the head of the Ministry of Health for a meeting that never came to be. However, we powered on and spent 4 productive days in Marjofre, gathering with the local folks, discussing administrative issues with our Haitian partners, talking over the final floor plans for how we will divide up the space - patient waiting area outside on the porch and under a palm shaded front yard, 2 consultation rooms, a little ER, pharmacy, lab, maternity, a bathroom and administration.  All in about 800 square feet.
Jeanne talking about cervical screening on our clinic porch
This month we did 105 cervical screenings in 4 different towns, making our total count in the last year 575.  Jeanne is now in charge of continuing the screenings and teaching staff.  Many thanks to the donors for this project.  We will be bringing the trainings to the southeastern towns of Belle Anse and Thiotte in the next year.
Our team - Hispañola Health Partners - Patnè Sante Ispanyola
We have raised about a third of the $12,000 we need to finish the clinic, as we wait for 501 (c) 3 status, please write me at llindenmeyr@gmail.com to find out how you can make a tax-deductible donation now.  Our new, improved website will be up and running in a few weeks - I'll be in touch.  Our motto, created by the founder of the clinic, Fritz Regis (last guy on the left) is:
                                                         LOVE PEOPLE
Cascade Pichon - we had a cool swim on the way back from Belle Anse

Tap-tap gallery - the flora of Port au Prince
Samson and Dalila on bottom, caption "a friend in need is a friend indeed" on top





Saturday, May 10, 2014

Missing virgin

Hello friends and fellow wanderers, you will have to read the entire blog before you get to the mystery for which this entry is named.  Ja-ja, the Haitians are teaching me some crafty tricks!

The finish of week three on the set; the thunder just rolled off the mountains down to the Pedernales seashore with such a resounding KABAMM that it set off a few car alarms down the road.  Probably the Red Cross vehicles whose drivers are loading up on beer and pollo frito at the restaurant a block away.  Rainy season is full on and it took us all week to get smart enough to make it to the beach on time after work before the customary 3 hours of persistent afternoon rain.  Everyone is thrilled despite the flooding and veneer of green is beginning to drape itself over the landscape of cactus and rubble. The air is 10 degrees cooler.

The three ring clinical circus I brought to Sant Santè Anse-a-Pitres has packed up and headed out - I'm super pleased with how the trainings have gone, and relieved that they are over.  I began last week with the didactic part of cervical screening, followed by 4 days of practical application.  The nurses were engaged and are on their way to becoming proficient.  Jeanne will supervise them in continued learning in my absence. 

The Speculators

                                      


The biggest feature was the captivating performance of Dr Mary Gratch, who dedicated a week's precious vacation, away from St Barnabas Hospital in the Bronx, to teach the docs and nurses here how to use the ultrasound machine that has been collecting a generous layer of red dust since it arrived here 3 years ago.  No one had any clue how to use it.  The word spread fast and the clinic has been packed with big bellied women for the last 4 days.  Mary taught staff how to judge dates, head and placental position, moms could see the little baby's heart beating, with directions ricochetting around a hot, crammed room in three languages.  She is a rockstar!!  This can give the providers and families here a chance to do advance planning for perinatal emergencies like breach, placenta previa, fetal non-viability, etc.  Just as a note, the first two births I saw here before Mary came produced dead babies, for a variety of reasons, most being total lack of prenatal care.


Dok Mary doin her thing

The UN Peacekeepers who were living next door to the clinic since the expulsion of Aristide in 2004 moved out about a year ago, so the land and the existing buildings have been lent to the clinic for the meantime.  Problem is, there is no power there so the resident handymen have had to jerry rig a series of generators, solar invertors, twisting bare wires into ridiculous contortions and risking electrocution and the destruction of the fragile sonography unit.  The machine is way tougher than we thought however, and behaved miraculously.  None of this drama was prepared for before Mary and dozens of large women were waiting as 9:00, 10:00, 10:30 drifted by.  Mary was a supa-troopa, Gras a bondye.

There's a little Haitian proverb that might be apt for anyone coming to volunteer here: Si ou renmen grenn anndan, ou dwe renmen po a tou.  "If you want the nut, you better like the shell too."

Using old UN trailer and my battery-powered projector for training

                                      

       When the UN packed up, they took the Virgin with them - they kept the nut and left the shell 
The Hispañola Health Partners team is meeting today in Pedernales to travel to Jacmel where we will further strengthen the collaboration with the Haitian Ministry of Health for our community health center in the mountain region of Marjofre.  Many of you have generously donated to this cause, thank-you, thank-you.  Along with the details of how this goes, my next chapter from deep inside Haiti will include a little more about the ethnobiology of witchcraft and various tetrodotoxins found here. 

This is highly toxic datura which grows up in the hills, the base for atropine and scopolamine


bye for now, Louise


Thursday, May 1, 2014

Goat on the road



     Welcome back dear friends, to my first entry since last November, accompanied by the first rainfall today since that date.  After a searingly hot afternoon, dragging my sweaty body back across the border, I sensed the unmistakeable ozone scent wafting through the windows as I was chowing down an enormous meal of la pechuga, chicken breast with salad, rice and beans. I realized it was pouring outside; the streets flooded with torrents of brown water, whirling plastic bottles, leaves and other detritus of life moving at breakneck speed.  And me without my umbrella!

I returned to the Haitian/Dominican border a week ago - the first part of my month here involves teaching my colleagues at the health center in the little town of Anse-a-Pitres how to do cervical screening for cancer using a simple technique involving vinegar, a headlamp and cryotherapy for positives.

Community health promoters identifying my reproductive organs!!

This week I am doing three didactic workshops for promoters, doctors and nurses and next week will be doing practical training with patients coming to the clinic for screening.  Dr. Mary Gratch, a friend and OB/GYN from NYC is joining me to do a training on pelvic ultrasound at the same time. Cluster-teach Haitian style!!  It has been an arduous job translating Spanish PowerPoint presentations (175 slides), courtesy of an American organization that does similar trainings in Central America called Grounds for Health,  as well as other training materials into kreyol with the help of my Haitian nurse, Jeanne. My search for an organization that does similar work to partner with has been in vain.  Few non-profits access this far corner of SE Haiti, so the lone wolf continues to roam the hills.....

Last week I was joined by Lydia Marden and her daughter Sadie from my beloved old stomping ground, the State of Maine.  Lydia is a nurse practitioner (we've been best friends since nursing school in the 70s) and Sadie is in her 3rd year of medical school. We did some cervical screenings in a remote fishing village about an hour by moto from Anse-a-Pitres.  The "president" of the town owns the only recognizable business there, a bar of course, so we did the gyn exams on tables on the dance floor between the giant speakers, with a gorgeous cliffside view of the sea.

Sadie doing her exam between the Marshall stacks!!

our seaside clinic from out back


     Things continue to improve from my perspective here, granted I am an optimist, but you can't argue when you seen the decommissioned cholera beds, plenty of staff running around and new construction underway at the health center.  The addition is being built by a Spanish NGO, Arquitectos sin Fronteras, and will include labor, delivery, exam rooms and an operating room (can't imagine where the surgeon will come from) for C-sections, etc.   We thought it would be done by now but there has been a little hold up in the funding.  Solar panels now bring enough current to run a computer and the light for the microscope as well as a dull nighttime bulb in the little ER and a light trickle of water runs from some sinks.  
Off the job and hopefully not to come back during the rainy season

Arquitectos sin finanzas

goat on the road

more later, much love, Louise