Haiti – Mar 9-16, 2019

Volunteer Optometric Service to Humanity- Pennsyvania
Report of Eyecare Mission to Cap Haitien, Haiti, March 9-16, 2019

March 9 – March 16   

Team members, Mark Rakoczy,OD, team leader; Mike Gordon, OD; Mike Satryan,OD; Melissa Summers, Chrystal Vermeulen, Jill Joseph, Becca Sinclair, Pam Finelli and Mariam Labib.

We were accompanied by SEE surgeon Dr. Jeremy Joseph.

The following is our visits to various villages and statistics:
Monday March 11- Limonage- 252 patients, 13 Glaucoma, 13 cataract, 3 pterygia
Tuesday March 12- Bod me Limbe 102 pts, 1 Glaucoma, 1 cataracts, 5 pterygia, 1 entropion
Wed. March 13- Bod me Limbe -81 pts, 1 Glaucoma, 4 cataracts, 3 pterygia, 2 others,
Thurs. March 14- New Hope Hospital- 467 pts. ( A March trip record) 16 glaucoma, 12 cataracts, 3 pterygia,
Friday March 15- Cap Haitien (Madalin) 246 pts, 11 Glaucoma, 2 cataracts, 3 pterygia, 2 others

We are making 10 eyeglasses back home to be delivered later… we delivered eyeglasses previously made from the January trip to Joseph. He will find their owners.

Total 1148 patients, 32 cataracts, 42 glaucoma, 17 pterygia, 19 others.

Many thanks to our clinic coordinator, Joseph, for his diligent work in organizing our different sites, and interpreters Marc, Maurice, Gemes, Savio and Brez for their help with patient care.

Dr. Joseph and Dr. DuPuy performed 60 surgeries for the week, these were not all ours but a lot of them were. I will get a final number of cataract patients so that we can pay the clinic.

We hired another van to transport our patients the day after 3 we were at a clinic. We had them make two runs after the day at New Hope hospital. A donation was made by Dr. Mike Gordon to cover this expense. This method was very successful in getting our patients to the Vision Plus Clinique.
Since we only had 3 docs, we decided to do both refraction and eye health by the same person, rather than overwhelming one doc in refraction or eye health. This worked out very well and I think I will continue this practice even when we have more. You know all the information about the patient and I feel, probably served the patient better.

Our group also spent about 2 hours post trip working on consolidating and updating the dates on the boxes of eyeglasses. I encourage all trips not only to take some of the older boxes from storage but also consolidate and update what is in them when you put them back.
A big thank you to Dr. DuPuy and VPC for accepting our patients and working with Dr. Joseph to take care of them.
Despite the travel warning, all was calm in CAP and the surrounding areas.
Respectfully submitted,

Mark Rakoczy, OD