Haitian professor helps his homeland

Dr. Fritz Francois spent much of his adult life away from his hometown of Port-au-Prince, Haiti. But when a 7.0-magnitude earthquake devastated his island, Francois, a doctor of internal medicine at NYU Langone Medical Center, knew it was time to return home.

"This trip was an opportunity to give back to [the] place that both literally and figuratively gave birth to me and nurtured my ancestry," he said. "I've never really had an opportunity to assist in providing any kind of help with some of the things going on, political or otherwise."

Francois said that even before the quake, his homeland did not have the infrastructure to support itself in the case of a natural disaster.

"It became magnified after the quake in terms of why they needed help because along with the buildings, their medical, economical and political systems basically collapsed," he said. "[The political leaders] could not provide guidance because they were going about trying to take care of themselves or their families."

So Francois decided that he had to do his part to help. He left for Port-au-Prince on Jan. 22, only 10 days after the earthquake struck, with a seven-person medical team. The team was composed mostly of French-speaking doctors and nurses to respond to the destruction, three of whom were of Haitian descent.

"We both share [a pride for our Haitian heritage] and that has permitted us to bond over the past two years," Patricia Poitevien, medical director of pediatrics at the NYU Hospital for Joint Diseases, said.

Francois became the leader for Langone's multidisciplinary Haitian Effort and Relief Team.

"To be able to do that and to go and provide whatever little assistance I could was important," he said. "A lot of my family in the U.S. could not physically get there, so I was representing all of the individuals who wanted to rush back home and assist but could not."

Francois blogged and updated Facebook daily, providing information to the NYU community on the team's work.

"I was relating things as they happened in terms of people I was caring for and got to know — names, stories, dreams," he said. "That's really the important thing that strikes at the heart. Just because Haiti happens to be across the water doesn't mean that the people who live there aren't mothers , fathers, brothers and sisters."

Francois returned to the city last Monday. He hopes that he and his team will be able to provide long-term assistance as needed.

"This may mean keeping doctors on the ground and taking whatever means necessary to continue the efforts we began," Francois said. "We must continue to recognize that suffering will outlive cameras and give a voice to those who don't have that voice."

Alexandra Bolen is a contributing writer.