Boileau, Haïti is a small hamlet situated about 10 Km away from NOVA’s property and the two-story house that is soon to be converted into a NOVA permanent medical facility. In 2001 The Haitian Pilgrim Ministry of the St. Philip the Apostle Catholic Church in Lewisville, TX built and gifted to the Boileau Parish a small approximately 1500 square foot medical clinic that it has supported and operated until January 2012. Operations were discontinued when the clinic doctor took another position and stopped working at the clinic. At this point, Haitian Pilgrims saw an opportunity to bring in a more robust medical management team. Haitian Pilgrims asked NOVA to take over management of the clinic and staff.”
NOVA has collaborated with The Haitian Pilgrims since 2008 on several levels, and earlier this year we were offered the opportunity to take over management and operations of the Boileau Clinic. When NOVA’s own facility is completed this clinic at Boileau will become a NOVA Clinic satellite.
After much discussion throughout 2012 between the two groups and the Diocese of Les Cayes in Haïti, a working partnership was established. A joint field trip was made during the last week in November 2012 to assess the clinic site, present a working operational overview to the leaders of the parish of Boileau, evaluate the prior staff and recruit a full-time physician. The field trip was a complete success! Agreements were reached at all levels and the clinic will be officially reopened during the week of NOVA’s 14th medical mission to Haïti, January 26, 2013. We will have the opportunity to work with the Boileau staff during this first week of operation and establish appropriate guidelines and expectations. If all proceeds as planed, NOVA will move the Boileau staff to its new facility in Martineau once the NOVA’s clinic has been completed, then convert Boileau to a satellite clinic with full services, but no longer serving as the hub of operations.
The Boileau Clinic currently has strong ties to the Minister of Health of the southwest region of Haïti and already has a vaccination program in place for local children, both sustained by the Minister of Health. NOVA will expand the reach of this vaccination program to isolated areas through the use of Agents Santés (certified health care agents) that it will be training during 2013 and 2014. In addition, NOVA will launch its Mother-Child program for pregnant women and their children to five years of age at the Boileau Clinic site.
Now NOVA will no longer have to catalogue and box unused medicines until the subsequent scheduled mission, nor worry about the expiration dates of pharmaceutical products sitting dormant in a hot climate. Medicines remaining at the close of one-week missions will be transferred to Boileau and put to excellent use in a timely fashion throughout the year.
This is a exciting development for the people of southwest Haïti and a landmark leap ahead for the NOVA Hope for Haïti project. Thanks to this intensified collaboration with our Haitian Pilgrim partners, NOVA is finally going to operate and manage its first permanent medical facility, a goal that has been envisioned and coveted for over a decade!
