Sad Little Berto

This is Berto. He arrived Sunday afternoon after we received a call from a neighbouring pastor who had come across this sad little boy when he arrived to pray with Berto's grandma. Our first sight of Berto brought tears to my eyes as he was by far in the worst condition I've seen first hand since starting to work in Haiti. His whole body was covered in sores, and his fingernails were embedded into his hands. His feet were covered in sores and scabs and his toenails were jelly-like. Berto's head was filthy and also covered in sores, and right away we could tell there was some form of brain injury by the telltale flitting back and forth of his eyes. I was amazed to suddenly realize how much he resembled Naika, another brain damaged child we have here. We asked his mother if he had been dropped or had fallen and she said no. SO, at this point we are speculating trauma at birth or perhaps shaken baby syndrome. Berto has a very high pallet and so Melinda figured that he is so small because he cannot suck, and his mom did not have the means or knowledge to feed him other food.

Giving Berto a bath

The dirt in the water is the filth from his head...we hadn't even gotten to the rest of him yet!

His feet were all swollen and covered in sores and filth

We weighed him and he is 9lb 4 oz....oh, and he's one year old.

Melinda calming him down after she finished cleaning and bandaging him all up.

Berto is holding his own at this point. He is being tube fed and is doing well with 4oz of formula. His head and feet are looking much better today. He was seizing constantly so he is now on an anit-convulsant medication called Phenobarbitol, and this has helped tremendously. He responds when we call his name, though is not able to focus at all. Please pray that he continues to improve and that stay well when Melind heads to the states on Wednesday.