The last time Gardnerville resident Charles Held was in Haiti was as a U.S. Navy doctor in the 1970s.
He remembers its inhabitants crammed in rows of small cinderblock houses.
"It was incredibly poor with a very tiny percent of the population sitting on top of the heap, on top of the hill in mansions, but the vast majority living at the bottom in very basic, basic conditions," Held said. "I don't think things have changed very much."
The 64-year-old pulmonary doctor was in his office in south Gardnerville on Thursday, wrapping up business for the day, so he could drive to Reno later that night and stay at his daughter's house.
The next morning, with four suitcases in hand, Held boarded a plane and set out for one of the poorest nations in the Western Hemisphere. Three weeks earlier, a 7.0 earthquake had devastated the Caribbean nation of Haiti.
"I think we get pretty complacent in the U.S., and I'd rather do something positive than just throw money at the problem," Held said while sitting in his own waiting room. "People have given me cash donations to buy supplies, because they know I'm going there. Carson Valley Medical Center gave me $1,000 worth of supplies to take."
Held is meeting 12 other doctors from different relief organizations, including Comprehensive Disaster Response Services, New York Medics, and the Islamic Medical Association of North America.
For two weeks, he is staying in a tent camp, a makeshift hospital of sorts, in an abandoned amusement park outside of Port-au-Prince.
"We're bringing people into the camp," Held said. "Reports are that patients are showing up from 7 in the morning to 6 at night, with a few stragglers coming in after that."
Held said the camp has antibiotics, simple surgical equipment, pain medicine, local anesthetics, dressings, gauze, wraps and splints.
"There's obviously no X-rays," he said. "The biggest challenge is that we are used to a comprehensive set of capabilities. In Haiti, we're going to have to deal with what we got. If we run out of something, then we'll just have to make do."
For his trip, Held stocked up on respiratory medicines and nebulizers, antibiotics and scalpels. Three of his four suitcases were stuffed with medical supplies, weighing a total of 140 pounds.
"My clothing only weighs about 10 pounds," he said. "Because we only get one meal a day, I'm also taking some freeze-dried backpacking food because it's light."
The pulmonologist is no stranger to humanitarian work abroad. In 2005, he spent 10 days in the Himalayan foothills of Pakistan helping victims of a 7.6 earthquake. That's where he hooked up with the Islamic Medical Association.
"It was one of the most stressful and rewarding things I've done," Held said. "The hardest part is knowing that the people would do better if they had access to top-level care, if they had that option."
Although optimistic about relief efforts in Haiti, Held said people should keep one thing in mind.
"It's not going to be a 1-month, 2-month, or 6-month issue. It's going to take a long time," he said. "People who were with me in Pakistan in 2005 are still there. The same thing is true for Haiti. In a major earthquake like this, the infrastructure disappears. Nothing works. It's a mess. They're going to need our help for a long time."
