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Mission of Mercy
By Rich Harbert
Reposted with permission - GateHouse News Service - wickedlocalplymouth.com
PLYMOUTH, MASSACHUSETTS
A team of nurses from Jordan Hospital is answering the call for help in Haiti.
Sue Madden, Joanne Russo and Linda Callanan flew to Port-au-Prince Saturday morning for a weeklong stint helping victims of last January’s earthquake.
The three nurses all work together on the hospital’s orthopedic floor, where they tend to patients with limb injuries. They will return with three more of their colleagues for a second stint in September as well.
The nurses will be working with the humanitarian group Mercy Ships and will work 12-hour shifts at a new medical facility recently built just outside of Port-au-Prince.
Madden, Russo and Callanan expect to be working this week with a team of orthopedic surgeons from Texas. They anticipate much of their work will involve repairing the many emergency amputations performed in the streets in the immediate aftermath of the Jan. 12 quake.
Madden, who has participated in other Mercy Ship operations, organized the Haiti effort after the quake hit. She quickly found five volunteers from her own floor. The team’s visit was delayed until the benefits of the nurses’ specialized care could be maximized.
In addition to working with surgeons, the nurses are experienced in helping patients adjust to prosthetic limbs.
Their mission of mercy is really a townwide effort.
The community pitched in to help send them to Haiti by attending a fundraiser at the CabbyShack in April. In addition, colleagues at the hospital have helped the team assemble medical supplies they will be taking to Haiti with them. Jordan Hospital gave the nurses all the immunizations they need for the trip.
Nurses Sara Parks, Marianne Wolcott and Pauline Walker will join Madden, Russo and Callanan when they return to Haiti for a second week of volunteer work in September.
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