Haiti – Mobile Clinic

A bi-monthly program where travel to surrounding rural areas bringing medical personnel and medications from Mombin Crochu Hospital to those unable to travel to the medical clinics.

THE MOBILE CLINIC: A SAFETY NET

Lack of safe roads and transportation in the mountains of rural Haiti has made access to health care impossible for many living here. For this reason, VPI has sponsored a Mobile Clinic since 2015, which travels to the alternating remote areas twice monthly. Here medical care, vaccinations, medications, screening and support are delivered with compassion and care. Each month between 150-200 patients are seen, patients that would otherwise receive care. Without this mobile clinic, this care could not be given

The continued need to raise funds to bring much needed health care, health education and preventative measures to remote and difficult to access mountain communities is evident. Although this is a densely populated area with close to 35,000 inhabitants spread out over approximately 25 square miles, the majority of the people living here have no means of transportation and are literally cut off from both emergency and preventative medical care. Only a very small percentage of the population has access to clean drinking water or latrines which results in serious outbreaks of Typhoid Fever, Cholera and gastro-intestinal parasites. An alarming percentage of the children are malnourished and the estimated life expectancy is 53 years with HIV/Aids, Malaria and Tuberculosis cited as the primary causes of adult death.

VPI Mobile Clinic serves the villagers who cannot come to the clinic in town and has established a consistent vaccination program, an active HIV/AIDS screening, and a public health program addressing: nutrition, hygiene, pre and post-natal care and the prevention of sexually transmitted diseases. The clinic utilizes the already established staff of two doctors, one nurse, a laboratory technetium, a pharmacist, a driver and two aides from the hospital in Mombin Crochu and operates twice monthly at a cost of $500 per trip. This means that for only $1,000 dollars a month or $12,000 for the entire year, children and families who are in desperate need of medical attention and care will be served.

In the words of the Haitian doctors who staff these clinics, “Human health in this area is in a precarious situation with a very high mortality rate for all ages of the population.”

What if your dream was to simply be able to feed your child, vaccinate her against measles, polio and meningitis, or even to offer her clean water to drink?

When we work together toward a common dream, we can do wonders.

The direction of the health center beds Mombin-Crochu plans to organize mobile clinics in the most remote areas of this town just to provide health care for the most vulnerable people in places where no service existed before. At my last clinic Laguamithe a leader in the area says: these organized by the management of the health center of Mombin-Crochu mobile clinics provide primary health care, a fundamental right, people living in remote areas and beneficiaries are very grateful. The campaign by the clinic has also educate people about the importance of hygiene to health has a positive impact on the community.

To continue with this activity is of paramount importance both curative and preventive level, management needs money to buy drugs, inputs, fuel and per diem for staff.

Provide quality health care for vulnerable people in remote areas, health promotion, health education, these are the goals set by the clinic.

— Dr. Cherenfant Miles