A few months ago a colleague of mine invited me to take his place as the sole Orthotics & Prosthetics clinician on a humanitarian rehabilitation mission trip to Haiti. I have always been interested in getting involved in this sort of work, and gladly accepted the offer to join the team. My current intern, Michael Weiss, wanted an immersion experience in O&P and decided to accompany me on the trip to assist. The plan was for us to travel for 10 days with a team of physical and occupational therapists to a small clinical facility that has been established through The Advantage Program which was set up by Lumiere Medical Ministries. The facility houses a small fabrication laboratory that is staffed by Frankel, a local technician who assists in the fabrication and who also helps maintain patient's devices once the visiting teams have left Haiti.
Labels: haiti, prosthetics, travel