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Blood Reserve plans support team for Haiti |
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Written by Sherri Gallant
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Sunday, February 21 2010, 9:39 PM |
The plight of Haiti’s quake victims has plucked at the heartstrings of both young and old on the Blood Reserve, and the community’s lone physician is organizing a medical relief trip to depart in March.
Dr. Esther Tailfeathers has amassed people from the Blood Tribe Dept. of Health that includes Registered Nurses, paramedics, support staff and others.
“Once I announced it to the people I thought would be interested, it just snowballed — everybody wanted to come,” Tailfeathers said.
“It’s so nice to do something good for strangers and it’s nice to be able to give from a community that has a tough time with funding itself. We are a very small and poor community, but you can see the empowerment that comes from people wanting to help someone else. It’s very heartwarming. And actually, the first big donation we got was from children.”
Tailfeathers said about a dozen people are on her team.
“Most have medical training but there are a couple of people who will assist as support staff, helping on the ground with transporting medical supplies and helping us connect to other medical teams in the area.”
Dr. Daniel Bester, a Lethbridge-based doctor with a practice in Cardston, recently returned after organizing an ad-hoc medical mission to Haiti. Bester, who worked on the Blood Reserve for a number of years as well, is helping other medical teams to form in hopes enough volunteers can be gathered to enable continual 10-day rotations to Haiti, for as long as they are needed.
“We’re connected with Dr. Bester,” Tailfeathers said. “Whichever physicians have volunteered to go, it’s really up to each one to develop their own team and set up their own fundraising to get their team down there.
“My team is basically made up of Blood Tribe Health employees, although we do have some volunteers that are not employees of Blood Tribe but have worked with Blood Tribe patients for a long time.”
Two people from the Haida territory in B.C.’s Queen Charlotte Islands will be part of the team as well.
Dr. Susan Christenson, a San Diego physician who’s from the Blood Reserve, will run the clinic on the reserve during Tailfeathers’ absence. Christenson works part time on the reserve, coming up to see patients every six weeks.
West Jet is helping with air fares, and Pam Heavyhead, the Red Cross representative on the reserve, is working to co-ordinate the collection of medical supplies. Heavyhead’s helping co-ordinate community efforts as well, including some student-led activities.
Students at the middle school have raised more than $700 to buy supplies and are putting together kits for kids in Haiti who’ve lost everything.
“Inside shoe boxes they’re putting together all of the items they think are necessary for children there, so we’ll be taking those with us, from one group of children to another group of children,” Tailfeathers said. “Some of the women in the community want to collect supplies to send down for women’s health - little emergency packages with tampons and pads, toothpaste and toothbrushes, and condoms. The women tribal employees want to put their own bags together and send them down with us.”
Money is still needed for antibiotics, dressing supplies for wound care, urgent-care items like suturing, eye and ear-care supplies, and respiratory medications like asthma inhalers. Tailfeathers has asked tribal members who have crutches they’re not using any more to bring them in, as many people in Haiti need crutches and canes.
Cheques should be sent to Blood Tribe Health dept., Haiti Relief fund, P.O. Box 229 Standoff, Alberta T0L 1Y0. Tax receipts will be send out for donations over $100. Tailfeathers is working on securing a Lethbridge location where donations could be brought, as well.
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