Fond des Blancs, Haiti, January 2018

HRFU Hernia Mission at St. Boniface Hospital Fond des Blancs Haiti 2018

The Saint Boniface Hospital in Fond Des Blancs Haiti operates upon 300 patients a month doing mostly emergency operations.  They therefore had a long waiting list of elective patients many of which had hernias.  Dr. Tommy Lee, a surgeon that has lead an HRFU team and been on other HRFU trips came with disposable equipment to operate upon 24 hernia patients and to train and observe inguinal hernia operations performed by 2 of our previous trainee surgeons Dr. Einstein Bellora and Dr. Saint Cyr.  Both were tested with the OPRS rating scale on 4 and 5 patients respectively and did well.  They will be given more mesh.

Dr. Luther Ward and Dr. Padovany the head general surgeons and their staff were excellent hosts.  They also operated on hernias that week so a total of 48 hernia patients were operated upon that week.

This type of trip has high impact with only one team member and the model will be followed in the future as well as teams of 6-8 team members when hospital personnel can be used.  The only concern is short turn over times, so the normal volume of cases can be completed.