WEST LEBANON — Dr. James Geiling recalls being at a medical conference in Miami about 11 years ago when a 7.0-magnitude earthquake struck the Caribbean nation of Haiti.
Doctors from across the country, he said, watched on television screens as broadcasts detailed the destruction — entire neighborhoods flattened, a death toll in the hundreds of thousands and more than 1 million people living in temporary shelters in the capital of Port-au-Prince.
A week later, Geiling — then the chief of medicine at the White River Junction VA Medical Center — was on a plane with a team of Dartmouth-Hitchcock doctors and nurses bound for the impoverished island.
Over the coming months, they would work to stabilize the country’s medical system, treat victims and train health care workers.
Geiling, a former army medic with 25 years of experience, was often found at the bustling University Hospital compound, coordinating the needs and resources of international providers.
Many health care professionals who responded to that disaster made lasting connections in Haiti, and they say it’s now difficult to see the country again struggle in the wake of a 7.2-magnitude quake that struck last week, producing familiar images of suffering.
Geiling, now a teaching professor of medicine at Dartmouth’s Geisel School of Medicine, is among them and said in an interview earlier this week that his “heart has always tugged” to the people of Haiti, who have endured not only natural disasters but also political instability, extreme poverty and gang violence.
“I would say that anyone who’s been down there, and particularly those who went down right after the 2010 earthquake, are just feeling terrible,” he said. “There’s just an immense amount of suffering going on. … We wish we could help.”
But aid, or at least the level of help that Upper Valley residents and institutions provided to Haiti more than a decade ago, isn’t yet on the way, and logistics are largely to blame.
“There’s no place for people to go down and volunteer efforts at this point,” said Dr. Peter Wright, professor of pediatrics in the Division of International Medicine and Infectious Disease at DHMC.
Wright has led the ongoing Dartmouth Haiti Partnership that carried out several humanitarian missions in the country since the 2010 quake, including efforts in the southwestern city of Les Cayes, which was heavily damaged during the most recent disaster.
“There’s no housing, food, water or anything to support the kind of effort that Dartmouth made after the earthquake in Port-au-Prince,” Wright said.
And getting that type of infrastructure ready, he added, is more difficult because gangs are more common, patrolling main roadways in Haiti and harassing travelers.
As of Friday, the earthquake that struck Haiti’s southwestern peninsula killed at least 2,189 and injured 12,268 people. Meanwhile, more than 300 people were estimated to still be missing.
More than 100,000 homes were damaged or destroyed, leaving about 30,000 families homeless, according to official estimates. The earthquake also was trailed by a tropical storm that brought heavy rain and strong winds at the beginning of the week.
Until aid workers can establish more of a foothold in Haiti, Wright said, he’s working with his contacts in the country to at least send financial help. The Haitian Global Health Alliance, which has links to air transportation into Les Cayes, is one such avenue and is taking donations on its website, www.gheskio.org.
Wright said he’s also working with colleagues to get aid to La Sucrerie Henry, where he’s worked to improve prenatal care. The community, closer to the quake’s epicenter, saw heavy damage to its school and clinic that will likely require the structures to be rebuilt, he said.
The International Committee of the Red Cross and its affiliate organizations also have teams working on aid efforts in the country, said Christina Hammond, an international reservist for the group.
Hammond, an Etna resident who previously responded to disasters in Haiti, Florida, Texas and the U.S. Virgin Islands, also predicted that it would be some time before responders from the Upper Valley are sent to provide aid.
Although she was put on “standby” to go to Haiti, Hammond said, the challenges that Wright highlighted — infrastructure problems and the presence of gangs — likely mean that governments and search and rescue teams will be operating there first.
Hammond also doesn’t speak fluent French, meaning she probably won’t be among the first waves of Red Cross volunteers. Still, she said, it’s difficult to watch the destruction from afar and not be able to help.
“It’s really tragic that this country has had so many issues,” Hammond said. “It really breaks my heart to think about it and about them going through more of the same.”
Lebanon City Councilor George Sykes shared similar feelings. A retired firefighter who spent two years assisting the Red Cross in its 2010 Haiti recovery efforts, Sykes said he’s checked in to make sure friends still there are uninjured.
However, he said, it’s hard not to be able to do more. Sykes is working to start a fundraiser in conjunction with the Rotary Club of Lebanon but said he’d return to the country if called upon.
“They just can’t catch a break, that country,” Sykes added. “Every time you turn around, there’s something that just makes life really, really difficult there.”
While Upper Valley responders aren’t yet able to make physical trips to Haiti, some are working with contacts in the country to help remotely.
Dr. Brian Remillard, section chief of nephrology and hypertension at Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Center, is working with medical students and residents using telehealth tools to provide renal care and dialysis to earthquake victims.
Since visiting Haiti in 2010, Remillard has built up a relationship with Hôpital Universitaire de Mirebalais, which was created by Partners in Health in response to the quake.
Over the past six years, he’s engaged with residents at the hospital, bringing many up to DHMC to train.
On Tuesday night, Remillard planned to be online with them for hours, helping them diagnose problems and complete procedures.
“I’d say the difference for me between 2010 and now is they actually have the skill to handle this themselves,” Remillard said of Haiti’s growing medical corps, adding that many of his medical students are now working to set up dialysis machines and deliver aid to victims.
It’s those long-term connections, not just short-term solutions, that Haiti desperately needs, said Bise Wood Saint Eugene, who migrated to the Upper Valley from Haiti in 2014.
Saint Eugene left the country when the humanitarian work of Odevich Haiti, a nongovernmental organization he founded, drew him into conflict with local gangsters.
“I think what we’re seeing over the years with Haiti is that not only national leaders failed in their mission to protect and provide for their country, but the world failed,” he said.
“I would call upon individuals around the world and governments around the world to focus their efforts to help Haiti rebuild,” Saint Eugene added. “It’s a tragedy, but I think it’s also an opportunity for humanity to wake up and play its part.”
Tim Camerato can be reached at tcamerato@vnews.com or 603-727-3223.