January 30, 2010

CHICAGO – Staff of the Caribbean-American Family Health Center, one of several satellite clinics of Lutheran HealthCare, Brooklyn, N.Y., are preparing to provide treatment for patients arriving in the United States from Haiti – while at the same time caring for their own professional staff whose family members are either missing or have died there.

Lutheran HealthCare, including its network of family health centers and Lutheran Medical Center, is a social ministry of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA).

The Caribbean-American Family Health Center arranged for pastoral care and behavioral care services immediately after the Jan. 12 earthquake in Haiti, said the health center's director, Claudette Richardson, in an interview with the ELCA News Service. The center is located in a community where tens of thousands of people from Haiti or those with family in Haiti reside. The medical staff typically treats 90 to 150 patients daily, she said.

Since the earthquake, patients and staff have sought pastoral care and behavioral care for depression and anxiety triggered by the disaster and its effects on family and friends, Richardson said. Of the 35 staff at the Caribbean-American Family Health Center, nearly half have some direct connection to Haiti, she said.

"I can't imagine what some of them (staff) are going through. They don't know the whereabouts of family members," Richardson said. She said most have continued to work with the knowledge that family members are still missing or have died.

This week the center has begun to receive patients who've arrived from Haiti, including a pregnant woman and two children, she said. None was injured, but they were seeking help for depression or anxiety, she said. The center is preparing to receive more who have been traumatized or who were injured in Haiti, Richardson said. No one will be turned away if they do not have health insurance, she said.

"We are here for our neighbors, for our community," Richardson said. "We are culturally sensitive to the needs of our constituents, and (we hope) they come here for care."

Lutheran HealthCare has at least six medical staff on the ground working in Haiti, said Larry McReynolds, executive director of Lutheran Family Health Centers and executive vice president, Lutheran HealthCare. They include at least two surgeons, nurses, nurse practitioners and staff trained to provide treatment to people who are HIV-positive or have AIDS, he said. Haiti has a significant population of people living with HIV and AIDS.

The organization is preparing to treat people with HIV and AIDS arriving here from Haiti, as well as those suffering from depression, anxiety or physical injuries. The number of people from Haiti seeking treatment will likely increase over the next few weeks, McReynolds said. He expects many will seek treatment at the family health center.

"Some are very sick people," he said.

Lutheran HealthCare's family medical centers are staffed to serve the ethnic and cultural diversity of Brooklyn's neighborhoods, McReynolds said. The same is true for the pastoral care staff, he said.

As for staff, about 10 percent of those working at Lutheran HealthCare are Haitian, McReynolds said. The earthquake in Haiti has deeply affected them and their coworkers.

"One of our doctors here got a call from a family member with the news that nine family members died in Haiti," he said. Another staff member learned that eight classmates died in a building collapse, said McReynolds.

Staff has persevered the past couple of weeks, he said. "The work environment is the support environment. People have been saying, ‘I've got to come to work because my coworkers are in the same boat as me and together we can get through this,'" McReynolds said.

The Rev. Donald A. Stiger, ELCA pastor and senior vice president for mission and spiritual care, said the medical center's pastoral care staff has been working at the Caribbean-American Family Health Center since the earthquake, providing support groups, prayer, worship and individual follow up with patients and staff.

He said the medical center has linked with Lutheran Counseling Center, Mineola, N.Y., a separate organization, for behavioral health services. Lutheran HealthCare staff has also raised nearly $7,000 to contribute to ELCA International Disaster Response, he said.

Information about Lutheran HealthCare, Brooklyn, N.Y. is at http://lutheranhealthcare.org/, on the Web.

ELCA News Service