Haiti: Psychosocial support for displaced people

Starting at daybreak, the narrow, steep street leading to the Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) clinic at the Pétionville Golf Club, is crowded with displaced people. They need to see a doctor, especially because the previous night's rains have produced what are described as "respiratory problems, fevers and infections". Around the medical facility, families repair their improvised tents and women wash clothes that are already soaking wet. Mattresses lie exposed to the sun. This landscape illustrates the complications of life inside Haiti's camps.

Inside the clinic, the team of MSF psychologists is already at work. They have just completed the morning's psychological education session, during which they provide information on normal stress and trauma reactions. They also give to the patients suggestions on positive coping mechanisms to help patients understand the psychological consequences which follows a traumatic event so that they are able to help themselves.

"Most of the patients present with physical complains and symptoms, such as loss of appetite, memory problems, sleep problems, cardiac palpitations, flashbacks of the event," says psychologist Djénane Marlhen Jean Charles, a member of the local medical staff since 2006.

MSF offers relaxation techniques and group counselling sessions to normalise their feelings and complaints, and reduce the level of anxiety. "This strategy works 80 percent of the time. However, if a patient presents with severe or psychiatric symptoms and who requires medical attention, we refer them to a psychiatrist and continue to offer psychosocial support," she says. The patient may be referred to the St. Louis medical center, where MSF treats psychiatric crises.

The psycho-social support offered helps individuals who experience fear, sadness, anxieties and concerns for the future and those who experience feelings of hopelessness. The earth continues to move beneath their feet and the future appears to offer only grim prospects. Living on a golf course that has become a disgusting marsh, for lack of drainage and an organized system of latrines, the displaced people of Camp Pétionville Golf Club have come to seek help from psychologists. Without lasting solutions to the situation they face, they hope this help will allow them to hold on.

MSF psychologists have given over 12,300 individual consultations to earthquake victims, since January.  Psycho-social activities at medical facilities and in camps have been organised for a total of 58 800 Haïtians.