Ronald and Jacqueline Kouri, humanitarian directors of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints for Haiti, return again and again. They bring food, supplies, sewing machines. Most of all, they bring the human touch. Jacqueline Kouri never hesitates to pick up even the dirtiest child. Though she has learned Creole, or Kreyol, the language with which she reaches them is one of the heart. A touch, a smile, a nuzzle.

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Matthew Bracken's the only member of the Healing Hands for Haiti medical team who stays in one place. He spends every day at St. Vincent's. It has a small prosthetics clinic and that's what he does. He makes braces and artificial limbs, helped by locals he's been training on every trip he's made to Haiti. Some of them have artificial limbs themselves.

Last year, he made an artificial arm for Carlos, who's 16 and had an accident when he was 11. The boy has grown and the arm now rubs on his shoulders, so he doesn't wear it. Soon, the problem's fixed, but Bracken has to retrain Carlos to use the dual-line limb, which ends in a hook.

He builds a brace for a 3-year-old whose leg is curved like the letter C. The child will wear it at night; that's when children do most of their growing. If the leg can't be trained to grow straight, he'll eventually either undergo a painful surgery or be permanently disabled.

Bracken has earned the nickname "Cowboy" because of the hat he wears, even in the shade of the clinic. He is, according to Joseph Jean-Paul, "a favorite" at the clinic.

John-Paul has shoulders but no arms. He was reared at St. Vincent's and remains as the receptionist. He wears two-part braces that are both crutches and hooked hands, a result of treatment he received in New Jersey. Perhaps because he was born with it, he has adapted well to his disability. He's a painter and a good one, using his prosthetic appendages to create Haitian scenes with brightly daubed acrylics.

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Over the course of four clinics, the Utah volunteers see a bit of everything. Though their focus and expertise is in rehabilitation, people come with infections, tumors, arthritis. Sometimes the care is rudimentary. Sometimes it's more dramatic, like giving a lightweight wheelchair to a woman who had been pushing her daughter in a heavy, old wagon.

Sometimes, there's just nothing they can do.

On the day Healing Hands' own clinic opens, a boy, about 10, complains that he can't go to school because he's weak and sick, always tired, continually falling down. As nurse Beth Weekley and Dr. Jeff Randle watch, he fails a series of balance tests, teetering dangerously when he tries to walk heel to toe.