Haitian Medical Services Recover from Earthquake

The United States military continues to provide the earthquake ravaged nation of Haiti with assistance through Joint Task Force - Haiti (JTF-H). The JTF-H Surgeon, Col Jennifer Menetrez, MD, spoke with me and other reporters today from Haiti. Menetrez is board certified in physical medicine and rehabilitation and subspecialty board certified in pain management.

Col Menetrez told us that the hospital ship USNS Comfort has no patients aboard today with injuries due to the earthquake. All Haitian patients have been transferred to Haitian medical facilities or discharged. At the peak of its operations, Jan. 29, she said that the ship's personnel performed 50 operations that day and had 485 Haitians on board. She is pleased that Haiti is now able to handle the medical needs of its people.

Menetrez feels the situation in Haiti has greatly improved since the U.S. Military arrived. There are 130 mobile clinics and 150 fixed clinics now serving the population of the region, including the camps where quake refugees are housed. She describes the close and non-competitive cooperation among the various non-governmental organizations, the various militaries (U.S. And other nations) and the Haitian government.

Asked specifically about Haitian amputees, she was able to address news reports and rumors of thousands of people having lost limbs due to injuries. As an expert in that field, she looks for amputees wherever she goes, and she "is just not seeing them." Col Menetrez says that there may actually be less than a thousand and it would not surprise her if there were less than 500 amputees.

The Colonel did confirm that six cases of malaria had been diagnosed in American troops that had served in Haitian relief efforts. Procedures for preventing that illness by daily medication were not followed, resulting in the illnesses. Medication must now be witnessed being taken, and no further cases of malaria have been found.

Col Menetrez had no definitive information on any cases of measles, typhoid or cholera in the disaster zone. She did confirm that some cases of tetanus had been reported.