The dental team concluded the week with a record breaking 65 extractions today! It started with 40 patients, each one eager to be first. Dr. JD Brutus reassured everyone that every patient will be seen. Each patient had to make a heartbreaking decision to identify the worst teeth to be extracted since many had multiple areas of pain. The work here is not done, it's far from it. But as promised, every patient was seen and treated by our dental team. Our goals for the future is to provide more than just emergency care (extractions) and to extend into preventative care.
The well team had a really productive day repaired faucets, replaced drains and showerheads, installed 4 ceiling fans in dorm rooms, hooked up the water station outside the orphanage where there is 4 showers and 6 sinks which is now operational for the community to use. On the roof, the tank installations were completed, the water was tested and came back negative for bacteria. The chlorinator was hooked up which sends measured amounts of chlorine into the system whever the pump pumps.
We finished up the day having seen about 165 patients, including the E.G.O. kids and kids from a neighboring orphanage.Throughout our day today, it was exciting to overhear someone say "when we come back next time"...especially from those who are visiting Haiti for the first time. This place is miserably hot, terribly filthy, and the suffering that is everywhere can make you feel very hopeless and that the problems are too overwhelming and big for us to make a bit of difference. However, when you catch a glimpse of a dying boy smiling, or see an orphan being loved, or see someone drinking clean water for the first the time that won't make them sick, we see that joy does exist.