Late call from Jay

Surgically, things have gotten so much better in the last 24 hours. There are now two wooden floor tents with AC in which to operate-- so they are no longer using the dusty classrooms for surgery. (There is a short video of the new tent ORs on the Operation Smile site.) In addition, the off-site day-surgery site is up and running well, providing an additional OR. They were able to get a broken auto-clave from another group-- which was then fixed by the team bio-engineer, so now they have significantly increased their turn-around time for instrument sterilization. Since they were running out of sterile gowns and sponges, the team asked the new Ecuadorian team if they could have some of their supplies-- so now they have another 24 hours of surgical supplies to operate. Spence Reid spent the first full day at the off-site OR, but Jay and Shane Johnson did a flap at that site today. And the plan is for them to go back to the off-site OR together again tomorrow.

There are quite a few not-medically-critically-ill, but ortho-critical (like serious spine injuries) patients who are in the camp. The camp is trying build a relationship with the USNS Comfort to trade patients. The Comfort is quite full beyond capacity now and cannot take new patients. But the camp is hoping to take 10 of their less ill patients in exchange for one of the camp's ortho-critical patients-- which will ease the burden of both situations. This afternoon the helicopter came and took the first of our team's patients to go to the Comfort.

I asked Jay if he felt traumatized. He said no-- and he hasn't seen anyone die. The critically ill patients with belly and chest wounds all died in the days prior to the team's arrival. They are mostly seeing the patients who received surgical care early on, but have developed infections. While they are not seeing life-threatening injuries, they are seeing a lot of limb-threatening problems. He said it seems like 50% of the people in Port-au-Prince must have sustained some serious limb injury.

There is an exit plan that is now in place-- subject to change, of course, but about 99% sure. A replacement team from Operation Smile consisting of non-Hershey ortho and plastic surgeons will be arriving by bus on Wednesday February 3rd. The teams will overlap by four hours during which they will orient the new team. Then our team will take the same bus out of Haiti back to Santo Domingo in the afternoon of Wednesday February 3rd to spend the night in the Dominican Republic. They will catch a flight sometime on Thursday February 4th back to Norfolk. Depending on their arrival time in VA, they may be in Hershey by the evening of Thursday February 4th-- or Friday February 5th. There is a small chance that one or two members of the team will stay longer to help transition the new team, but that seems unlikely at this time.

When I asked Jay what he wanted when he came home, he said he just wanted to live regular life again. Sit on a clean toilet, use a clean shower, and sleep in a bed that isn't dusty.