We’ve all heard about the devastation from the Haiti earthquake. But, just imagine if it was your homeland. Historic structures, like the National Palace in Port au Prince – our equivalent of the White House – leveled to the ground. Hundreds of thousands of countrymen dead or displaced.

 

The closest example at home would be the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina in New Orleans. Ironically, it was the similarity of Louisiana to his birthplace that drew Haitian native Dr. Yvens Laborde to New Orleans – the hot, tropical weather; the rich culture; the French-infused cuisine. “I ended up in New Orleans primarily because Boston was too cold,” he said with a laugh. “There’s some cultural and climatic similarity between Haiti and New Orleans, and so that was the attraction for me to come and further my education here.”

 

After graduating from the University of New Orleans, Laborde attended Louisiana State University School of Medicine in New Orleans. Following an internship at LSU Medical School in Shreveport, he came back to New Orleans for another internship at Tulane University School of Medicine. He completed his internal medicine residency at Ochsner Medical Center-West Bank, where he has practiced since 1995. But, he never forgot his roots, making trips to Haiti at least once a year to see his family. “Having been born and raised there, I’ve always felt an intimate closeness to the place,” he said, “because I feel like I owe a lot of who I am to my experience. I think it gave me a lot of knowledge of self, a lot of confidence and a lot of education. It prepared me well.”

 

Over three years, Haiti was slammed by three hurricanes, including Katrina, Rita and Gustav. At the time Katrina hit in 2005, Laborde was at Ochsner, one of the only facilities that stayed open during and after the hurricane, helping storm victims. Following Hurricane Gustav, he volunteered to go to Gonaives in Haiti to do a humanitarian mission through a relief fund provided by Ochsner. For three weeks, he provided medical aid and rebuilding assistance to his native land.

 

His experiences with hurricane-ravaged communities made him the ideal doctor to head up a medical mission to Haiti following the earthquake on Jan. 12. Just a few days later, Laborde was on the scene with a team from Ochsner, where he serves as regional medical director, vice president of medical affairs and member of the board of directors. With the assistance of a private plane, the docs flew to the Dominican Republic, then drove from Santo Domingo to Haiti. When they arrived at the Dominican/Haitian border, they were stunned by the chaos – people desperately seeking to cross the border to buy as many supplies as they could; guards aggressively trying to keep them under control. “The intensity of the number of the people and the activity was just overwhelming,” he said. “That kind of shocked me.” 

 

After driving for eight hours, the doctors finally arrived in Port au Prince. “Once we actually started getting close to the town, it became almost like an apocalyptic scene,” he said. “Eighty percent of all of the structures that I had remembered growing up had either been pancaked or structurally damaged. You could still smell the odor of decaying bodies. That was probably the most difficult part for me, seeing a building and knowing that a family was entombed inside.”

 

While some of the physicians headed south to Jacmel, Laborde stayed in Port au Prince. With the hospitals at full capacity, Laborde headed out on foot, accompanied by a supply-stocked vehicle, to reach patients at makeshift camps around the city. Along with Haitian physicians and med students, Laborde treated a minimum of 50 to 75 patients a day over three weeks for open wounds, amputated limbs and respiratory problems. Once the airport opened, planes made multiple trips to deliver medical materials from Ochsner, which Laborde and other volunteers delivered to orphanages, clinics and hospitals in need. “The wonderful thing was the response, not just from New Orleans and the United States, but in terms of the international community,” he said. “There were people from Spain, Italy, Belgium and as far away as Israel.”

 

In the midst of all of this chaos, Laborde suffered a personal setback – his father collapsed with a perforated appendix. Fortunately, the Italian surgical team had just set up a field hospital. “If I had not have been there, and the support had not been there helping the people that needed it, he would have died,” Laborde said. 

 

Through Ochsner, Laborde spearheaded the Haitian Relief Fund to purchase recovery needs. He plans to return to Haiti in April. “My saying is, we are all Haitians at this point in time,” Laborde said. “Just like when the tragedy happened in New Orleans, all Americans felt united as New Orleanians and came together to try and make a difference.”

 

For more information about Ochsner Haitian Relief Fund, visit the website at www.ochsner.or/lp/haitianrelief.