Below is an excerpt from Carolyn Cordtz, RN earthquake blog. Read more about her experiences in Milot after the earthquake.
Omg what a day. This place is amazing. They have really stepped it up to take care of all these people. The count today was around 420 patients (this was originally a 70 bed hospital…) they bulldozed a field and put up these MASSIVE tents lined with cots that are all full with patients and their families. The patient care culture is different down here-the family is at the bedside round the clock and they’re the ones cleaning the pts, cooking the food, feeding the pts etc.
Its amazing to see how involved all the family members are bc back home, the family rarely participates in the daily care and the nurse does everything.
The only side of it that’s hard down here is that some people don’t have any family left or their family is in port au prince. There’s a woman who has a fractured pelvis and lumbar who is actually able to stand but they don’t have the equipment to operate on her here but she wants to go back to port au prince bc her 2 young sons are there by themselves with no one left but without an operation, she probably won’t survive the trip to port au prince…
Visit Carolyn Cordtz’s Blog
