No matter what, tomorrow 21 people will leave JFK on a 9:30 AM Flight to Port au Prince to meet up with the other 5 volunteers who are already in Haiti.   Our 26 member team consists of doctors, nurses, translators, a driver and team leader.

Last Wednesday member of our team, plus other NOVA volunteers who aren’t going on this trip, met at the Church of the Presentation in Upper Saddle River, NJ to pack 21 bins of medical supplies, equipment, and other donations for the clinic.  Our medicine is ordered for a missionary supply company in Holland called IDA, and is already in Haiti.

Tomorrow the team will fly to Haiti where we will have to navigate the chaos of the Port au Prince airport and the sea of red caps trying to “help” us with our supplies and luggage.  We will meet our newly donated school bus which we will load with our luggage, supplies and team and travel 5 hours to Aquin, Haiti where we will be staying for the week.

Then on Sunday we will wake up and head to Cavaillon, an hour from Aquin, to set up the clinic, which takes the better part of a day.  By Sunday afternoon we will be all ready to open our doors bright and early on Monday morning and our 12th mission will be off and running.

Thank you to all of our donors who helped make this trip possible.  Without your support over the last 10 years we could not do the work we do in Haiti.

Please keep our team in your thoughts and prayers this week.

Sincerely,

-Joseph Nuzzi
Vice President of NOVA Hope for Haiti

Patient and Practitioner, the long walk back home

This four-year old little girl was carried on her frail mother’s shoulders some five miles through the countryside from the pounded earth floor of their thatched mountainside hut to NOVA’s 11th medical mission this past April 2011.  Word spreads fast in Haïti and this child had been ill with recurring respiratory distress.  Shortness of breath and air hunger are anguishing symptoms, especially for a child who does not understand.  She was treated with inhalation therapy and antibiotics.  Fortunately, Libby Barrett had volunteered for this trip, a registered nurse and pulmonary specialist from Saint Vincent’s Hospital in New York City where she had worked for years with cystic fibrosis patients and their lung complications.  She spent the entire afternoon cupping and clapping this child’s chest to clear inspissated secretions. When the clinic closed at sunset, there was no alternative for child and mother other than to return home.  We drove them part of the way but their hut was inaccessible for a long distance by anything but foot paths and several helped them with this long hike back home.  Arrangements were made for follow up care at the NOVA clinic the next day.  Although she showed signs of improvement, this child was in trouble and we were a day away from packing up the NOVA clinic for six months.  We provided funds for the child to be seen at a hospital facility an hour away but we returned to the States with misgivings.   NOVA maintains active records in the States of the very sick that were evaluated on these trips and we try to intervene when we can from a distance.  Sadly, our follow up phone calls revealed that this four-year old girl had perished at the hospital facility to which we had referred her.

Would this child have survived had NOVA’s permanent medical facility been in place and functioning under the care of its permanent staff?  No one can say.  What is clear is that tragedies like this one underscore the need for a permanent NOVA facility . . . and the quicker the better.  With sophisticated medicines procured at less-than-cost prices through the auspices of the IDA Foundation in Amsterdam, Holland, and the commitment of dedicated and concerned professional volunteers applying the the principles of  modern up-to-date treatment, the chances of survivorship in heart rending cases like these will be greatly enhanced.  This sad case has been a clarion call for us all to join hands with renewed vigor and establish NOVA’s permanent clinic by year’s end.

Will you help us accomplish this?

This year our friends at DOMUS have chosen us again to receive the money they raise at the Garage Sale.

Please read further on how you can help with this fundraiser, and please support our friends by visiting their store!

The garage sale is SATURDAY, JUNE 2, (rain date Saturday, June 9) on 44th Street between 9th and 10th Avenues in New York.

HERE IS HOW YOU CAN HELP:

DONATE ITEMS YOU DON’T WANT, CANNOT USE, OR HAVE NO ROOM FOR!    Take this opportunity to do your spring cleaning and simplify your life! Items must be clean and in sale-able condition: household items, SMALL pieces of furniture, music, videos and books, as well as accessories (not clothing as we don’t have facilities for people to try them on), would be great.

ASK THE COMPANY YOU WORK FOR TO DONATE ITEMS they produce or have a surplus of.  Many Companies have samples or other items they want to find a good home for, so why not give them for a good cause?

E-MAIL THIS TO ANYONE YOU KNOW. Even if you don’t have any unwanted items, maybe your friends do. Please forward this letter to them: the more varied the merchandise, the better.

DONATE YOUR TIME TO HELP US STAFF THE TABLES ON SATURDAY, JUNE 2! The garage sale brings hundreds of people to 44th Street, so we need help in selling the donated items. We generally have 2-3 hour shifts and we provide drinks and snacks. The day starts at 8.30 and ends at about 6-6.30. It’s great fun and it’s for a good cause!

DONATE MONEY! If you can’t donate items or your time, please consider donating money to NOVA Hope for Haiti.

Please contact DOMUS: fundraiser@domusnewyork.com to discuss items you want to donate or for any questions you may have. Please make sure you enter “GARAGE SALE” in the title.

THANK YOU FOR ALL YOUR HELP!

www.domusnewyork.com

Not only was the 35-foot, 65-student capacity bus released in perfect working order, but the Order of Malta and Mr. Carr installed a full-length heavy-duty roof rack and access ladder made of enameled high-gauge stainless steel to transport luggage, equipment, medical supplies and medicines. Since the cost of shipping from Miami to Haïti is 68% less expensive that from Port Elizabeth, Mr. Corr’s son, Sean Corr, a Nascar racing driver for Empire racing, and two of his colleagues volunteered to drive down to Florida NOVA’s school bus and two additional ones being shipped to Honduras and Guatemala.

NOVA’s bus has arrived in Miragoâne, Haïti and is currently awaiting customs clearance.  The vehicle will be an extraordinary help transporting volunteers on a five-hour trip from the airport in Port-au-Prince to southwestern Haïti where NOVA operates in the town of Cavaillon.  On our May 2012 Mission alone we will save about $3,000.00 in vehicle rentals: long distance buses, daily tap-taps, and trucks to cart equipment and supplies.  In addition, when the NOVA clinic is completed the donated school bus will provide transportation to and from the clinic for villagers residing in remote areas where currently several-hour journeys are made on foot.

The school bus is an incredibly useful asset that will make life much easier in Haïti for both provider and patient alike.  NOVA Hope for Haïti feels deeply privileged that it was chosen to receive such a practical and significant gift and extends sincere thanks to the Order of Malta and its two Knights, Robert Reers and John Corr, and also to Sean Corr for making overseas transportation of the bus feasible for NOVA.

More photos will be loaded when this bus is full of 26 volunteers in just a week!

NOVA Hope for Haiti is sending our 12th medical mission to Haiti May 5-13, 2012.

In partnership with the Church of the Presentation in Upper Saddle River, NJ, we are sending a team of 24 doctors, nurses, translators and support volunteers to open an emergency care clinic for 7 days in Cavaillon, Haiti.

The core of the team is in place and the volunteers are already getting excited.  We are still recruiting doctors, nurses and translators to join us and the spots are filling up very quickly.

Our medicines are being ordered and shipped to Haiti from IDA and logistics are being worked on.  We are all very excited about this mission as it is the 10th anniversary of us working in Haiti.

In addition to getting the clinic organized, ordering medicines, purchasing plane tickets, making travel arrangements for a team of 24 people in Haiti and everything else that goes into organizing a major medical mission, the team is also responsible for raising the $12,000.00 of the $22,000.00 needed for expenses for this mission.  This does not include airfare which the volunteers pay for themselves.

$10,000.00 of the $22,000.00 is being generously donated by the Church of the Presentation in Upper Saddle River, NJ.

We need your help to make this mission possible.  All money donated toward the upcoming medical mission will go directly to purchase medicine, supplies, and ground expenses for the team.  Please help us provide medical care to men, women and children who have none in a country that has suffered much.

A $500.00 donation will pay for all the expenses of a medical mission volunteer to provide medical care, including medicines, for the week we are in Haiti.  Can you help?  Any amount will be great appreciated!

DONATE NOW HERE.

Right now NOVA has a team of doctors, nurses and others working on designing a mother – child program in Cavaillon.  The program would run all year and make a profound difference in the health and well being of the families in the community.  Our team is working on designing a program that would provide basic, ongoing care, from pregnancy to age five.  Pregnant women would receive vitamins and iron, and regular check ups.  The children would receive regular examinations, have charts, receive vaccinations and have access to a doctor and medicine when they are ill.

We are currently searching for a facility that can be used as a clinic in Cavaillon until our permanent medical and volunteer facility is built. NOVA is seeking to rent a building in town that can be retrofitted for this purpose, or possibly build a small, simple structure on our property that will be used until we raise the funds for our large structure.

We will be seeking to hire a local, Haitian doctor, a local nurse and possibly an administrator to run the program.

Our goal is to have this program up and running early in 2012.

Images by Tony Savino, 2010

Images by Tony Savino, 2010

We had clearly defined criteria in choosing a home base for our mission in Haiti.  We sought a community that:

1) had no medical care available to the population

2) would offer the possibility to grow from a bi-annual medical mission to a permanent medical outreach

3) was relatively easily accessible to highways for transporting volunteers and supplies

4) was also accessible to people in the outlying mountain regions where the population tends to be even poorer and have access to less services

Cavaillon met all of these criteria.

Cavaillon is a French colonial town in the south west of Haiti.  The church in the town center dates back to the 1700′s and in the main square is buried a hero of the Haitian revolution which ended in 1804.  The town is located right near Highway 2 which connects Port au Prince and the city of Les Cayes as well as many towns and villages along the way.  Cavaillon is about a 5 hour drive from the capital and a 40 minute drive from Les Cayes which is served by a regional airport.

The town center is relatively small, with a few paved roads around it’s picturesque french colonial town center.  However, Cavaillon is the center for a large population of rural farmers who live on dirt roads climbing hours up the mountains around the town.  The people making up this rural population are among the poorest people in the western hemisphere.

The town hosts a bi-weekly market on Wednesdays and Saturdays which is very crowded and everything from live stock, to school books, to fresh fruit, rice, beans, salt, and clothes are sold.  The market is attended by people from other nearby villages and towns, and also by many, many people from the mountains who make the trip to sell their agricultural goods and to buy household items.  Because of this market many of the people from the distant mountain communities have been served by NOVA’s bi-annual clinics and will be served by our permanent medical facility.

Cavaillon has become a home away from home for many of our regular volunteers who have been visiting the town since 2004.

For more images of Cavaillon see a gallery of photos of the town and people here.