A team of Yale School of Medicine (YSM) and Yale-New Haven Hospital (YNHH) physicians and medical professionals trained in disaster response left this morning for earthquake-ravaged Haiti. In addition to providing trauma and surgical expertise, the physicians are carrying humanitarian aid that includes donated medical equipment and supplies to treat the injuries of thousands of people and prevent further spread of infection.
The team and supplies left New Haven before dawn in a van donated by American Medical Response (AMR) ambulance company, which also donated a defibrillator. The AMR van took them to Teterboro Airport in New Jersey.
At Teterboro, the team then boarded a private aircraft donated by business jet manufacturer Dassault Falcon. The flight was arranged by Corporate Aircraft Responding in Emergencies (CARE), a network of aviation specialists who assist as first responders to catastrophic events. CARE helps to place non-profits and NGOs in need of air transportation with aircraft and flight crews available to fly on behalf of disaster response efforts. The plane will land in Cap Haitien with subsequent transportation down to the Hinche region, where the team will link up with Partners in Health, the Boston-based organization that has been working on the ground in Haiti for more than twenty years.
The Yale team consists of:
- Gregory Luke Larkin, MD - emergency medicine
- Donald MacMillan, PA - emergency department
- Tom Kimberly, APRN - emergency department
- Nousheh Saidi, MD - anesthesiology
- Peter Boone, MD - orthopaedics, St. Vincent's Hospital, Bridgeport
It is expected that the team will remain in Haiti between one and two weeks, and that a second team will follow.
Last week, YNHH, the local chapter of the NAACP and other community organizations created a fund that the Community Foundation for Greater New Haven will administer for relief and reconstruction in Haiti. The hospital has pledged $5,000 to the fund. The hospital has also donated $12,000 worth of medical supplies to be shipped with the team going to Haiti on Tuesday, in addition to $18,000 in YNHH supplies already shipped via AmeriCares, the Stamford-based non-profit that gives disaster relief and medical aid to people in crisis in the U.S. and around the world.
Photos: Yale team unloading supplies in Hinche, Haiti. Photo Courtesy Dassault Falcon.