LDS relief: Mormon doctors from Utah set up new clinic in Haiti

PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti — Nothing is routine in Haiti, especially setting up another makeshift meetinghouse clinic.

Each new day and new location means new patients and new challenges.

On Monday, the LDS Church-sponsored team of volunteer doctors and nurses responding to medical needs in earthquake-ravaged Haiti set up shop in the Croix des Missions meetinghouse of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

The church building is located in one of already-poor Port-au-Prince's most poverty-stricken areas, just a couple of blocks from what has become a key post-quake point at the Gris River.

Heavy street traffic — including trucks and buses — has created a crude detour from a closed, unstable metal bridge over lumpy, bumpy dirt roads and past women washing their clothes in the shallow waters — and past pigs and goats rummaging through refuse dumps located oh-too-close to the riverbed.

But inside the gated meetinghouse grounds awaits a veritable oasis — clean, near-perfect concrete driveways and parking areas, lush lawns, towering trees and a sparkling church building that medical staff says looks temple-like.

The only immediately visible signs of damage are at the front and back of the meetinghouse. On the front wall, a large stone sign — the Haitian Creole version of the church's name — has a noticeable crack running through it. Behind the building, the back cinder-block-and-cement wall has fallen flat on its side.

The crowd of homeless staying on the grounds is not as large at the Croix des Missions building as others in Port-au-Prince, such as the Centrale Ward and Petion-ville Ward meetinghouses — scores rather than hundreds.

Whenever the staff sets up a clinic, its members must transport a dozen or so pieces of luggage and bags containing medical supplies and pharmaceuticals, and then separate everything out in a makeshift pharmacy.

The team set up Monday's clinic in the back of the Croix des Missions chapel, in a tiled overflow and stage area beyond the last row of wooden pews. A clinic on the move means certain items may be in short supply.

Monday's missing supplies included a lack of water and snacks — not so much for the American doctors and nurses, but rather for them to provide to the Haitians who help at the clinics. Medical students help give basic medical care, English-speaking church members help translate communication between U.S. staff and patients. And other church members are asked to be logistics volunteers, helping with the flow of patients in and out of the clinic area. Water is also given to individuals who receive pills for medication.