Dr. France Goes to Haiti
by Angela Jones
In mid-January, a catastrophic earthquake shook Haiti to its core. Port-au-Prince, its capital city, was left in ruins. And thousands of people were desperately in need of medical care. When the call for help came, John France, MD, answered it. Dr. France, a professor in WVU’s Department of Orthopaedics, traveled to Haiti as a member of the International Medical Surgical Response Team (IMSuRT), which he joined in 2001 following the terrorist attacks on Sept. 11. This trip marked his first international deployment with the group.
“They needed a lot of orthopaedic surgeons, and it seemed like the right thing to do.” France said he was familiar with Haiti after having been there with the military in 1994. “It’s an ungodly place. The poorest people in the United States are well off compared to those in Port-au-Prince. It’s poverty beyond imagination. There’s no running water, no sewage, and now, it’s basically been leveled to the ground.” After meeting with fellow IMSuRT members in Atlanta, France arrived in Haiti on Jan. 23. During his two weeks there, the group treated about 1,300 patients and performed between 30 to 40 surgeries. The team worked in a tent hospital because the actual hospitals were uninhabitable. The patients he saw were both adults and children who had crush injuries or needed wound debridement. In retrospect, France said, the one thing that has stuck with him the most is the gratitude of the Haitian people. “It gave me a new appreciation for what we have here. The people there were happy and grateful for anything they were given, and they had no expectations,” he said. “It gave me a whole new appreciation for what I have and for our medical system.”
Photos: John France Spring 2010 | 27