Great Neck doctor haunted by aftermath of Haiti quake

By YAMICHE ALCINDORyamiche.alcindor@newsday.comFebruary 3, 2010

Louis Auguste, lost in the images of Haiti, sits at his desk staring into space. His mind, rattled with scenes of destruction, replays his week in Haiti treating hundreds of patients a day.

"It's overwhelming."

Five days after the Jan. 12 earthquake ripped through Port-au-Prince, the nation's capital and the place where he grew up, Auguste, 60, a surgical oncologist based in Great Neck, returned to the Caribbean nation to lend a helping hand.

He and 66 other medical professionals from the Association of Haitian Physicians Abroad traveled aboard a plane sponsored by JetBlue Airlines. Members of the physicians' association, formed in the 1970s, have traveled to Haiti for the past 11 years on medical mission trips. What he saw, he said, he can't get out of his mind.

There is the young man who cannot eat because one arm has been amputated and the other arm is too weak to bring food to his lips. There is the dead body of a woman, half covered in the street and baked by the tropical sun. There are the children who, long after they have healed, remain among hospital patients because they're orphaned and homeless.

Soon after arriving, the group established a postoperative unit in Haiti's main hospital, and performed several amputations, surgeries and reconstructive procedures. Workers cared for patients - too traumatized to remain indoors - under donated tents.

Despite having grown up and traveled in the city, Auguste said he was shocked to see the destruction in Port-au-Prince and the blighted state of the people there.

"Patients would spend days not eating or eating whatever the next bed over would share," Auguste said.

Familiar places - churches, markets and stores - were replaced with large piles of rubble and dust, Auguste said. His brother and two sisters live in Haiti but were not injured.

In the midst of the chaos, Auguste said he saw Haitian people coming together. "We didn't see any arguing or problems," he said. "The people were very cooperative."

As weeks turn to months, Auguste said he worries about the patients he left behind. "My concern is that you're not going to have organization," he said. "I'm worried that the people who need the help will not get it."

>>PHOTOS: Newsday's Charles Eckert in Haiti | Frantic rescue effort in Haiti | Deadliest recent earthquakes

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HOW TO HELP

* You can help immediately by texting "HAITI" to "90999" and a donation of $10 will be charged to your cell phone bill and given automatically to the Red Cross to help with relief efforts.

* Wyclef Jean, a rapper and hip-hop artist from Haiti, urged people to text "Yele" to 501501 to donate $5 toward earthquake relief. Yéle Haiti is a grassroots movement inspiring change in Haiti through programs in education, sports, the arts and environment, according to its Web site.

* The State Department Operations Center has set up the following number for Americans seeking information about family members in Haiti: 1-888-407-4747. The Red Cross has also set up a Web site to help family members find and contact relatives.

* You can also go online to organizations such as the Red Cross and MercyCorps to make a contribution to the disaster relief efforts.

The FBI warned Internet users to be wary of e-mail messages seeking donations in the aftermath of the quake. People who want to send money or assistance should contribute to known organizations and should be careful not to respond to unsolicited e-mails, officials said.

Other Web sites accepting donations include:

-Haitian Health Foundation
-Hope for Haiti
-UNICEF
-International Medical Corps
-Beyond Borders
-AmeriCares

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