On a Mission
In a place not on most maps, two Duke doctors care for Haitian villagers
Friday, June 27, 2003
Ranquitte, Haiti, is described best by one visitor as "hot, very hot." And it's so small that it's not on many Haitian maps. But this rural village in the country's north central mountains has a strong pull for two Duke physicians.
On Tuesday, Drs. Lori Bastian and Randall Brewer left for Haiti as part of a six-person medical team that will spend one week in a clinic in a small Ranquitte school providing health care for the villagers there. Dr. Doug McKee, a family medicine practitioner whose office is affiliated with Duke, is also a member of the team.
Visiting a country that ranks as one of the poorest in the hemisphere and has a minimum of health care infrastructure, the doctors know what they can change is limited. But in an interview before they left, both Bastian and Brewer said they believe they can still accomplish a lot.
"You pretty quickly have to get used to trying to diagnose a stroke without using a CT scan," said Bastian, a Duke associate professor of internal medicine stationed at Durham's Veterans Affairs Hospital. "We won't have the technology we have here at Duke, but it's very rewarding work."
The trip was arranged through their church, Hope Valley Baptist Church, and a non-profit organization called Christian Flights, which operates a school and clinic in Ranquitte. Christian Flights regularly sponsors trips for American physicians to visit the clinic and provide care in the community.
While there, the doctors will be living in a school dormitory and work out of the clinic with the help of a translator, who will help them communicate with the Creole-speaking population. They're prepared to see a range of medical problems, but expect to see a lot of cases of malnutrition, dehydration and infectious diseases such as tuberculosis.
"We'll do for the people what we can," Bastian said. "But we realize that education is the most important thing, so we hope to help teach people about good health practices. Education is what's lasting."
Bastian said she'll bring gynecology textbooks for the nurse to use for educational purposes.
The pull for the two doctors to do this work comes through their faith and church, they said. "This is relatively easy for us to do," said Brewer, an assistant professor of anesthesiology. "It's a week out of my time. My faith tells me it's important work. I've talked to a missionary who has been in Haiti for 30 years, and he said I would come back a different person."
It's the first mission trip for Brewer; Bastian previously has gone on trips to Liberia and Tanzania.
"I was looking for an opportunity to get involved in medical missionary work again," Bastian said. "I've always had an interest in serving the underserved. It's a different way of practicing medicine, one where there's more of an emphasis on your approach to caring."
Duke physicians have a long tradition of work in Haiti. Dr. David Walmer goes there almost monthly. Dr. Paul Farmer, a Duke alumnus who is a medical anthropologist and infectious disease specialist, is a medical director of a Haitian clinic who has pioneered novel ways of treating infectious diseases in poor, rural communities.
The doctors said they are proud to continue in that tradition.
"Just the preparation for this trip has been exciting," Brewer said. "I didn't know much about Haitian health care before this. It's really unfathomable to me that this kind of poverty and medical problems can exist in our own hemisphere, so close to us.
"Everything that I've learned about Haitian history and culture has just made me want to help more."
