ARTICLE - QUEST TO PREVENT BURNS

TEANECK LAWYER IN QUEST TO PREVENT BURNS IN HAITI
(North Jersey) - By Deena Yellin

TEANECK — Months after his return from a relief mission to Haiti, the desperate cries of "ammwe" reverberated in Sam Davis' ears. It means "Help me" in Creole, the Teaneck lawyer explains.

Hearing those pleas from injured victims of the 2010 earthquake moved Davis to action.

"The conditions in the operation rooms were awful," he said, describing his horror as he walked through hospital wards and saw patients lying on hot steel gurneys under the sun as their wounds lay exposed.

"In many of the hospitals the care was primitive," Davis said. "There was a shortage of medical supplies, equipment, antibiotics and bandages."

Helping strangers is nothing new to Davis. In 2007, he founded Burn Advocates Network (BAN), a Teaneck-based non-profit that provides rehabilitation and recreation for burn victims around the world.

After the earthquake, BAN sent 50 tons of medical supplies to Haiti, arranged for the shipment of an oxygen generator from Holy Name Medical Center to Hopital Sacre Coeur and established a physical therapy department at Justinian Hospital on Haiti's north coast.

Now the organization is raising funds to build a burn center in Haiti.

"The main burn center was destroyed in the earthquake," said Davis. "The burn patients were languishing in hospitals without having their burns properly cared for."

The burn center will be integrated into Hopital Sacre Coeur in Milot, which is undergoing expansion and which Davis calls the bright light among hospitals in Haiti.

The burn center, a two-story facility that would accommodate 15 beds, is scheduled to break ground in January. Davis still hopes to raise an additional $1.2 million to cover costs. A fund-raiser for the center will be held in December.

'Open flame society'

Burns are rampant in Haiti, which Davis describes as an "open flame society" because of the rechaud, a cooking device with a coal- or propane-fueled stove that every family uses and keeps lighted most of the day. Davis estimates that the apparatus is responsible for 80 percent of pediatric burns, which send several thousand children to Haiti's hospitals annually.

As a personal injury lawyer who has dealt with countless burn victims in 30 years in practice, Davis said he's seen firsthand how a serious burn injury can wreak havoc on someone's life. Victims are left not only with physical disfigurement, but with emotional scars, he said. They often are ashamed to go out in public and become isolated. Children suffer from depression, isolation and have a higher incidence of substance abuse as adults, he said.

Davis' Burn Advocates Network has sent musical and recreational programs to 22 burn camps, as well as clinics and centers in the United States, Haiti and Israel. The organization also has founded Camp Sababa in Israel to help burn victims.

Yves "Fan Fan" Joseph, a well-known Haitian singer and founder of the popular band Tabou Combo, said that BAN's work is essential in Haiti.

"It's very important because these patients were being put in regular hospitals and they need special care," said Joseph, who lives in Teaneck and performs throughout the world. "Kids get burned from the cooking device, they touch the live electrical wires in the street, and there's no burn unit in Haiti today."

Joseph, who immigrated to America from Haiti in 1971, praised Davis for launching an education initiative. "A lot of the kids still play with fire. A prevention program is very important," he said.

Davis is planning his sixth mission to Haiti in November, to focus on burn-prevention education.

"The goal is to teach children and their families that they must keep children away from these rechauds," he said. "If they do get burned, they need to get to the hospital immediately and not use folklore medicine, which can cause more harm."

Lack of trained doctors

Even minor burns can result in infection, or even death, if victims don't get proper medical attention on time, said Davis. Burn patients with second- and third-degree burns need to get antibiotics, skin grafting and physical therapy to prevent contracture, he said.

But all too often, there's a lack of trained doctors and medical supplies, which prevents them from getting the care they need.

In his upcoming mission, he hopes to meet with the Haitian president and new minister of health to launch the burn-prevention campaign, which will be the most effective way to deal with the problem.

He also hopes to get the government's support for the new burn unit and for networking all the burn facilities in the country.

And as he does on most of his trips, he will make the rounds with a crew of volunteer physicians.

"We do rounds in the hospital and talk to the younger generation of Haitian doctors and nurses," Davis said. "They watch our doctors and learn from them. I feel like every time we go, we save lives."