Team Canada Healing Hands Inc is a not-for-profit organization dedicated to the provision of rehabilitative education, training, and care in areas of need.
L’Equipe Canadienne – Healing Hands Inc. est une organisation à but non-lucratif dédiée à subvenir à l’éducation et l’entraînement en réadaptation ainsi qu’à administrer des soins dans les endroits qui en ont le plus besoin.
HAITI EARTHQUAKE: HOW YOU CAN HELP
07/FEB/2010
We are deeply grateful for the multitude of people who have contacted us wanting to provide assistance, equipment and spearhead collection drives for supplies. While we wish we could use all of the support so generously offered, Team Canada will be concentrating our efforts on fulfilling the human resource needs for rehabilitation professionals desperately required to train and provide care for the large numbers of injured and disabled.
The World Health Organization has requested that Handicap International (HI) and Christian Blind Mission take the lead in forming a sub-group on disability that will focus on the coordination of assistance for Haitians suffering from traumatic injuries leading to both short term and permanent disability. Team Canada Healing Hands (TCHH) and Healing Hands for Haiti are working closely with this group.
With respect to equipment and supplies, the immediate need is for wheelchairs and crutches for those with amputations and fractures. While the donation of equipment and supplies that have been offered to TCHH may be usable at a future date, we do not have the infrastructure to collect, store or ship these items at this time.
Teams working in Haiti are only interested in new equipment or in excellent shape. Those of us who have been providing rehab services in Haiti for the past 10 years know that equipment needs have always been there. One of the issues is that the expertise and hardware to repair wheelchairs and equipment is not available in Haiti, nor are the roads and sidewalks kind on the equipment, resulting in a much shorter lifespan that they would have in Canada or the USA. This means that those people who are using these chairs and equipment must wait for our teams to get to Haiti to repair them. Also, there is no “garbage system” in Haiti, so many of these items end up on the street when they can no longer be used.
It is estimated that there have been between 2,000 - 4,000 amputations as a result of fractures and infections. The goal is to establish agreed guidelines so that all people fitted with prosthetics will be able to be treated and have them repaired anywhere in the country. It is now planned that ICRC (International Committee of the Red Cross) technology will be used to provide prosthetic devices. This technology has been designed in and for use in the developing world. Healing Hands has been training our Haitian technicians and using this technology for the past 2.5 years. Recycled components will have uncertain value in the rehabilitation of Haiti’s Amputee Population and are unsustainable with an unpredictable supply and types of components needed to construct these highly specialized devices..
We strongly urge you to support the needs of the injured and disabled by financially supporting Team Canada or another group working to provide long term training and care for the many Haitians left with a disability in the wake of the January 12th earthquake.
On Tuesday, January 19 five past volunteers from Team Canada and Healing Hands for Haiti left Canada and USA to join a Handicap International response team on the ground in Port au Prince. The five members, lead by Dr. Colleen O’Connell included specialists in Physical Medicine & Rehabilitation, Prosthetics, Orthotics, Physical Therapy, and Occupational Therapy. All have been working diligently to assist in coordinating the care of the many newly disabled patients resulting from the January 12 earthquake.
One of the first duties was to assess the condition of the Healing Hands for Haiti medical campus. Upon inspection by an expert it was deemed that all buildings are uninhabitable at this time. The guesthouse where the teams stay is still standing and in the best shape, but will require significant repairs. Other buildings are completely destroyed or are well on the way to toppling. It is with a heavy hearts that we must report that two tenants in the apartment building did not survive its collapse. All of us at Team Canada HealingHands extend our deepest sympathies to their families.
Click to read an account by orphanage staff and residents of the earthquake and its aftermath in Jacmel
The Handicap International (HI) team then turned their attention to gathering data regarding types and numbers of injuries to ensure the HI response will meet the needs for the patient population. The Therapists started individual patient data collection, early treatment and training and giving supplies, while the others gathered detailed general data collection from hospitals – aiming to visit all hospitals in the area. The goal is to determine current and longer term needs, types of diagnoses, etc.
As news reports have stated and the research confirms, the numbers of amputations are staggering. In addition the team has seen dozens of traumatic brain injuries and spinal cord injuries. All patients in most hospitals (or most patients in all hospitals) are outside in virtual tent cities of wards– buildings are mostly not safe or only parts of hospitals are safe. Patients are also too scared to go inside. General Hospital is a tangled network of many independent NGOs and military and government agencies.
On Tuesday, January 19 five past volunteers from Team Canada and Healing Hands for Haiti left Canada and USA to join a Handicap International response team on the ground in Port au Prince. The five members, lead by Dr. Colleen O’Connell included specialists in Physical Medicine & Rehabilitation, Prosthetics, Orthotics, Physical Therapy, and Occupational Therapy. All have been working diligently to assist in coordinating the care of the many newly disabled patients resulting from the January 12 earthquake.
