A little anecdote of CTC life

     "Hey, Grace, shall we play a game of checkers since things are so slow right now?" Asked Deidra.
     "Sure," replied  Grace, "just let me empty this last bucket here."
     In a few minutes, Grace was back and the two set up their game and settled down to play. Just as they were setting the last pieces on the board and Deidra was getting ready to maker her first move, one of the patients' care-takers stuck her head in the door.
     "Mis, an IV bag ran out."

     "Here, I'll take care of it," said Deidra. Grace quickly handed her an IV bag.
     Walking into the first patient's room, they notice that there is no big hurry. There is still an inch of fluid left in the old IV bag dangling from the wire hanging on the wall above the cholera patient's bed.
     With the bag in their hand, Deidra and Grace stand watching, waiting, while the IV fluid trickles slowly into the chamber and runs dow the line into the vein of the patient's left arm.
     Glancing across the room they notice a lady perched on her bucket with her eyes closed.
     "Hey!" Grace yells, "She's fainting!"
     The two girls race over to help hoist her up off the floor.
     Wilman rushes in to assist, shouting, "Cold water! Get some water!"
     Forcefully slapping cups of water that the two girls had gotten for him, into the unconscious lady's face, she started coming to and responding.
     Seeing that everything was under control with the lady, the girls once again remembered the IV bag they were to change.
     "Oh no," sighed Deidra, "It ran out."
     "Oh man," exclaimed Grace, "I'll get the syringe."
     When the two finished putting the IV back into function, they headed back to their game of checkers.
     They were about to the middle of their game when once again...
     "Mis? Mis" The girls looked up to the see the mother of a 19 year old girl patient standing in the doorway.
     "Mis, my daughter has a big problem."
     "What problem does your daughter have?" Deidra asked.
     "Well, Mis, my daughter has a probmlem. She doesn't sneeze."
     "She what!?" Deidra exclaimed, thinking she mis-understood.
     "She doesn't sneeze." Repeated the concerned mother.
     "Do you want her to sneeze?" Deidra inquired, trying to keep a straight face.
     "Well I see the other patients sneezing, but my daughter just doesn't. Couldn't you give her some medicine to make her sneeze?"

     Later one of the patients in the fish tank was looking extremely sick, and was throwing up all her medication, along with her ORS.
     "She isn't doing good." Said Grace, "I think we should admit her."
     The poor young lady was too weak to walk, so Grace and Deidra half walked, and half carried her around behind the CTC to the little spray down room.
     They made a bed for her inside the CTC and Mis Anita was called to come put an IV in her.
     The IV went in on the first try, and everything was good! They could relax again.

     The next shift showed up about then, and Grace and Deidra got to go back to the house and get some much needed sleep.

--Written and experienced by Grace and Deidra.

A steady flow...

Praise the Lord for His goodness and mercy, for His kindness towards us, and His compassions, which fail not!

Several days have passed since our last update, and much has happened. In this post, we'll just take a look at some of the highlights, with some pictures and comments.

There has been a fairly steady flow of people coming in and out of the CTC, as the epidemic tries to figure out whether to ramp up again, or go dormant. One could get the picture of a great thundercloud upon the horizon; there are rumblings, lightning, and maybe even some sprinkles and rain, but the full potential of this forceful storm lies near at hand. If it will come, no one really knows; if it will not come, no one really knows. The potential for the storm coming is tremendous, yet we hope that it is passing...

Jared, hard at work, keeping everything documented.
We have charts for each person, keeping track of their condition.

One of the highlights of the work here is sending someone home, after successful treatment.
Here, a little boy is discharged, after being monitored for several hours.
Everyone gets sprayed with bleach water before they leave
in order to destroy any germs left over...

A man waits with his son, as the boy is monitored.
Many times people come in with a sick stomach, thinking they have cholera, when it's something else.
That's why we monitor them for several hours, checking for cholera symptoms.

If things are slow for a few hours, there's time for relaxing, and a few good games of checkers :)

Today we had around 5 people admitted, and about the same in observation.
That's a great relief, considering a few weeks back, we had over 20 in here!
In this picture, Wilman mops the floor around the beds.

The lady on the right was in pretty bad shape, and was having a hard time keeping fluids in.
So, they had to put her on double IVs to sustain her hydration level.
The man on the left was doing well today, and has been taken off his IV.

The mop bucket.

Friends and relatives of loved ones outside, milling around, passing the time,
waiting for their dear ones to recover. 

Here is one of the observation tents, with a few people waiting inside.

Praise the Lord!

Just a note to say that we emptied out today! Yes, we had an empty CTC. After that we had a few observation cases come through, but nothing serious! The little boy that took so long to come around left this today. He was eating a banana just before he left. That was a welcome sign after him hardly wanting anything and vomiting about everything!

Praise the Lord with us!

The little guy...

Here are the promised pictures of the little guy, mentioned in the last post...

We tried giving him some nutritional supplement before lunch, but he didn't want to drink it... after getting some into him, he threw it all back up. Poor little guy. We are continuing to monitor him closely, and are trying various ways to get nutrition into him. 

More on him later, as the situation progresses...

Please keep on praying!

"...the waters returned from off the earth continually..."

In one of our earlier posts, Steve said:

"The Bible refers to “the enemy coming in like a flood”, and that’s about the extent of the cholera situation in Allegre, at the GTH CTC (cholera treatment center)." 


Now I am reminded of the verse in Genesis, in which Noah was waiting in the Ark, until the waters dried up:

"And the waters returned from off the earth continually: and after the end... the waters were abated."

The situation here has greatly improved, and it seems that the flood waters are receding! The last day or two, we have only had a few new people come in, and they haven't been very severe.

We have a total of only 5 people in the CTC today!
Praising God for His goodness, and for answering our prayers!!

We even have some beds put up now!
It is such a blessing to be able to catch our breath, after such a busy time...

Jared is pumping up the Gator tire, after making a run to the dumping site.

We do have one little guy that's about 18 months old, that has been in the CTC for several days; he just isn't bouncing back as we expected him to. We think he was malnourished to begin with, and had cholera on top of that. Anita is going to try giving him some supplements today; hopefully that will help him out. Would you pray for him? I'll get some pictures of him, and put them on later...


Have a blessed day, and thank you again for all you do! God is working in a mighty way here, and we are so thankful...

Midnight Meditations...

I went into the CTC last night around 10pm to check things out.

Here's what I found...

Looks like Jared decided to take a little snooze!!
He looks like such a sweet cherub, in his white robe...
Sleep in heavenly peace, our brother...
:) :)

This little boy was sleeping so soundly!
Earlier in the day I tried to talk with him, and he didn't seem to appreciate it very much...
He almost threw his food at me :) But after that, he seemed to lighten up :)

Lots of the family members that come with the patients spend the night here also.
I'm so amazed how they can just go right to sleep, with nothing but cardboard in between them
and the concrete floor!

Thea sleepily checks numbers on the charts... 

Did you notice anything different?
There are a lot less people around! Things are slowing down a bit, which is such a blessing.

May God continue to bless people here with healing. Oftentimes we play the Bible in Creole over a Proclaimer. Pray the Word of God would minister to the people here, and that they would receive it!!

God bless!

Life and Death are in the hands of the Lord...

Around the CTC today there is a sense of somberness, a little more gravity, than previous days. It seems like the inevitable nature of death has be brought fully into our view, and that we have to battle it with more vigilance than ever before.

Last night, we lost another patient...

Friends and relatives brought a casket for the deceased man...

The elderly man came in yesterday, severely dehydrated. We immediately tried putting two IVs into him, and after some struggle, were successful. It seemed like he was recovering as well as expected. We went on with the other patients, making sure to check on him, keep his IVs filled, etc. All seemed going well. His was the hand in the pictures we posted yesterday, showing the skin standing up after being pinched.

Then, during the night, as Thea was going into the CTC building, the man's wife stopped her; she told Thea that he was getting worse. She asked Steve to go and check on the man. He came back and told Thea he had passed away already. She came in and checked, and sure enough, he was gone...

It was amazing how quickly he went, so we were wondering if he had something else wrong with him. Everything had been going so well. It was definitely a shock to all of us.

Closing the casket after the body was lifted in...

They carried the casket away, headed for the burial.

Not all has been gloom though! We have been able to release over 35 people today. Some were in observation, and were not very bad, but it is amazing to think that so many people have been here, and have left revived and restored!

People being released! What a joy...

God is still on His throne, and we are reminded that He is the giver and taker of life.

We had another lady give us a scare; she was sitting there, and suddenly, slumped over, unconscious. Wilman (one of the Haitian helpers) ran over and grabbed her up off the floor. He yelled for water, and began to splash it on her face. We lifted her up back onto her cot, and after slapping her face, and splashing it with more water, she finally came to.

Here's the lady that passed out.
Anita is giving her another IV in this picture, shortly after she came to.

We put another IV into her, and set her up with a faster flow-rate. She seems to be doing ok as of this evening.

One praise report is that the little girl who had the EZ-IO (see the previous post) will be released soon! We removed the EZ-IO from her leg last night, and replaced it with a normal IV. She has improved so much, and we are rejoicing that she soon will be going home!

Removing the EZ-IO... it looks pretty painful!

Here's a closeup of the EZ-IO needle.
Pretty torturous looking if you ask me!
But it's a real life saver.

Thea and Anita team up giving the new IV to the little girl.
They got it on the first try!

We have received some very good help in the recent days... Myron has been leaving off some of his duties to give a helping hand, and Jonathan Widowski is down with his wife, Lissa, to help with the CTC. It is a real blessing to have their assistance as things continue to build up around here.

Myron and Jonathan change and maintain an IV.
(DISCLAIMER: Jonathan did not want his picture on the blog)

A little girl takes some ORS.

Please pray for strength and patience for those who are working at the CTC. It is rewarding work, but it can become tiring after a while.

Also, please pray that we would not loose any more patients. It is very discouraging and very sad for us to try our best and then loose someone. If we looked at people as statistics, we'd say we're doing pretty good: over 99% success rate.

But, we don't.

Each one is an individual life that has been lost or saved; and the condition of their souls sometimes is unknown. It is our hearts desire that not one would perish, so that they can have the opportunity to be saved.

God bless you all!

Tend to the sick and leave the well alone!

If yesterday was busy, today was insane...

At one point we had over 20 people in observation, and at least 10 admitted, with more coming in. Around lunch time, 8 people came walking in within 5 minutes of each other!

So today we have pictures of all that, plus some updated pictures of our little patient that we treated yesterday.

Here we go...

Here's the EZ-IO tap, without the bandages around it.
The needle goes into the bone, and delivers the IV solution through there.
It saved this little girl's life last night.

Here's the little girl, after the night's rest, and being on the IV for a while.
She looks much better, and was giving me some smiles today-- in between periods of crying :)

Here's a little one which we put an IV into this morning.

The little hands had little veins, which caused no little problems in getting the IV in!!

This girl came in pretty bad shape. She wasn't doing very well, as you can see.
The look in her eyes was so sad...

Now, later on in the day, she is bright eyes, and trying to get up!
She'll be released soon, I'm thinking :)

Here is a group of 4 that arrived at the same time.
Someone looked out and said "Hey, I think another person is coming!"
After they arrived at the gate, the guard asked those who were sick to step inside...
Almost all of them did!

Some potential patients waiting in the observation tent.
They are given ORS solution to drink, and are monitored until we can determine their condition.

Thea and Jared check out people inside the observation tent:
It got pretty hectic there for a while...

Along with lots of people, there must needs be lots of ORS to go around!

Lucien juggles a bunch of empty bottle as Thea and I make more ORS.

Ready to give out some ORS?
They look ready! :)

One elderly man who came in was so dehydrated, his skin stood up after pinching it...

We tried getting a picture of it, but he had been on an IV for a while, so it didn't stay up as much as it did
when he first came... which is a good thing!! :)

Thankfully, we haven't lost anyone else... please keep on praying!!

God's peace be with you!

From Death to Life...

Greetings in Jesus' name!

Things have been very busy at the CTC the last weeks. We have had an average of 15 people each night, which keeps everyone working pretty hard; couple that with the fact that we have only about 5 people to do the shifts, and things can get very tiring. But God has been very good to everyone, and things have gone, for the most part, very well.

Some pictures from today; several patients on IVs at various levels of recovery.

Here's another room with patients. It's amazing how clean everything is kept.

Considering the nature of the epidemic, it could be very messy,

but our wonderful staff do a super job.

Outside on the porch, people wait...

Here's the observation tent. Lots more potential patients here, waiting to be admitted.

Because of the influx of infected people, we've had to put up another tent outside for overflow.

Yesterday we had a startling happening: we lost our first patient.

It was a very disturbing experience; very sobering. I wasn't here for it, but those who were involved said it was very hard. Apparently he came in pretty bad shape, and as they were getting him ready for admission, his breathing began to fail. They rushed him in and started an IV, but it was too late. He passed away shortly thereafter. Such is the reality of this operation; life and death are in the hands of the Lord.

Tonight, though, we almost had another fatality; a little girl, about 5 years old, was brought in mid-morning. This evening, she started breathing hard, and losing her alertness. Her eyes rolled up, and she began almost gasping for breath- a sure sign that she was in critical condition. They had been trying IVs all day, but were not successful. Anita rushed over with a new system which drills an IV needle into the patient's bone, and began the operation. It went quickly, and was done before i got back with the camera. Below are some shots...

Just as i got there with the camera, they finished up the operation.

Here they are putting the IV tube in.

I wasn't sure if she was going to make it.

She was breathing really hard, and seemed to be out of it...

It looked really painful, but we were praying that it would bring the

life-giving fluids into her body before it was too late...

Thea made sure everything was holding together, as we waited in tense anticipation.

Suddenly, about 2 minutes after the IV started, she stared asking for a drink.

Anita gave her some ORS, and within seconds, her eyes brightened up!

She was going to be ok.

It was a real miracle... we had a prayer service, praising God for His goodness.

 So, we've gone from death to life, in two days. Yet again, it brings home the reality of the temporal nature of this life, and the looming inevitability of eternity...

More updates are coming up, so check back soon for more pictures, more stories, and accounts of the wonderful works of God here...

God bless!

-Nate