From one volunteer:
Last summer I came to Haiti for the first time to volunteer as a nurse with Ti Kay. I was nervous and worried about what I could actually accomplish. I have experience working in extremely poor environments and have often felt like the results of my efforts were just small band-aids pasted onto huge, intractable problems.
When I arrived, I saw right away that Ti Kay is different from many other international aid organizations.
All of the volunteers stayed in tents and we took tap-taps (Haitian public transportation) to the hospital. I worked alongside the Haitian nursing staff, both learning from them and supporting their work. And then there were the patients. I have never seen, even imagined, patients so sick, reduced by TB and HIV to skeletal figures who required oxygen support to breathe.
For many of these patients, Ti Kay was the clinic of last resort, one of the very few places they could get free, quality care.
What was most amazing about my experience was I felt part of something that is making a long-term impact in Haiti. Ti Kay provides care within the Haitian health system by supplementing the work of the national government’s tuberculosis program.
Every donation to Ti Kay goes directly to support the training of Haitian staff, to strengthen treatment adherence systems, and to provide necessities like oxygen, medication, and food
While the work is sometimes frustrating, often devastating, always exhausting, it is also incredibly rewarding. I have seen several patients who were near death when I met them the first summer, now healthy, smiling and breathing easily.
– Brooke Finkmoore, NP, MPH
The Skills we need:
Skills that help Nurses
- Adaptability and Flexibility
- Interest in teaching
- Patient-focus
- IV placement
- Nasogastric Tube placement
- A sense of humor
Skills that help Doctors
- Interest in teaching
- Adaptability and Flexibility
- Patient-focus
- Thoracenteses
- Ability to work with no back-up
- Chest X-Ray Reading
- A sense of humor