Former IMA President Heads Assessment Team in Haiti

New Windsor, MD – IMA World Health, a specialist in providing essential healthcare services and medical supplies to people in need around the world, today announced it will send a two-person Assessment Team to Haiti on February 10, 2010. Leading the IMA Assessment Team will be Paul Derstine, retired president of IMA. He will be joined by IMA’s Country Representative for Haiti, Dr. Abdel Direny, who has headed IMA’s office in Port au Prince since 2008.

Derstine lived in Haiti for over ten years, and has provided technical support on Haiti for various development organizations, including IMA, for the past twenty-five years. He will serve as Senior Advisor to IMA president and CEO Rick Santos on the Haiti relief and reconstruction situation.

“Paul has a deep love for Haiti and its people, and knows the country and the language,” said Santos.

“He knows and is known by the Ministry of Health, IMA staff, partners and fellow agencies, hospitals and clinics, and community leaders. It is rare to have someone of Paul’s stature, knowledge and qualifications available to oversee work such as this.”

Direny has developed partnerships at all levels of Haitian society and with international agencies, and will work with Derstine in developing comprehensive plans to address the Haitian health care crisis stemming from the earthquake.

The IMA Assessment Team will travel throughout Haiti to develop an analysis of the health care situation, the status of the nation’s health care infrastructure and IMA linkages, and potential opportunities to accelerate impact of IMA’s ongoing relief efforts. These efforts include the provision of additional medicines and medical supplies.

This response will center on the organization’s core strengths and capacities in Haiti. IMA has a working health delivery presence in seven of Haiti’s ten geographical Departments. This is a result of its role in the Haiti Neglected Tropical Disease control program.(NTD)

The portion of the program that IMA leads, which has treated more than 3.5 million Haitians, is funded by the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) through RTI International.

Given IMA’s familiarity with Haiti, the organization has been asked by partner agencies and others to provide leadership to determine health needs in Port-au-Prince and outlying areas. IMA’s Assessment Team will work with the Ministry of Health at all levels to determine the needs in communities for additional services such as provision of primary health care services. This will include communities either directly impacted by the earthquake or now facing a large influx of internally displaced persons. It is expected that health care needs will increase in many communities as a major exodus of people continues out of Port-au-Prince.

IMA’s Assessment Team will also work with the Association of Christian Healthcare Institutions (AICSH), with which it has had a long partnership. The focus will be on how IMA, its Member Agencies and other partners can help increase AICSH’s capacity to coordinate primary health care services among its 30 member institutions throughout Haiti.

“IMA’s Assessment Team will look for opportunities to develop effective Haitian-led capacities in community and local healthcare institutions,” added Santos.

“A significant outcome of the capacity-building process, as it has been in other countries in which IMA works, will be a strengthened sense of community in the areas in which IMA and our partners work. The goal must be a sustainable, effective and community-based Haitian health care system.”