Haiti Benefit Concert at OLMC

Music lovers will stop by Roman Catholic Church in Doylestown Sunday night to hear the Philadelphia Boys Choir and Chorale perform.

Tom Kardish will be there, enjoying “America’s Ambassador’s of Song,” but knowing that the group’s musical performance will be more than just great entertainment.

For $30 – the price of admission for one adult and one student – a Haitian family can have clean water for one year.

Kardish oversees the church’s Haiti Ministry, which has been sending teams of volunteers to the impoverished country since 2008.

Proceeds of Sunday’s concert will benefit that group.

The team focuses on households in St. Jude Parish in Port au Prince.

While the main part of the mission work centers on providing medical care, a side project was initiated in an effort to keep residents healthy. 

Financial contributions help fund residential water filtration and purification systems.

While the volunteer teams treat health issues facing residents - respiratory diseases, skin afflictions and intestinal maladies - many of those patients then go back to living in a home with unsafe water.  

“You can get somebody healthy for a couple of weeks, but then there are major issues that come up if you can’t help them because they don’t have clean water,” said Kardish.

Kardish said one of the group’s outreach projects has been to install water purification and filtration systems in area homes.

Last year’s concert, which is a major fundraiser for the organization, earned $6,000, Kardish said.

That translates into clean water for a few hundred families.

“It’s really one of the more gratifying things that has come out of this,” he said. “ It really can do some serious good.”

The team has employed a Haitian to check up on households to monitor the systems and continue educating people between team visits, said Kardish.

Water issues and proper drug choices continue to be of concern to the medical team, according to Dr. Joe Ferrara, medical director of the group.

“We are trying to improve our understanding of their needs and the proper approach to disease in this very different setting from our community,” Ferrara said in the latest OLMC Haiti Ministry newsletter.

With little data available, the medical team – including doctors, nurses and pharmacists – have been trying to formulate medication guidelines to match treatment to specific diseases.

For instance, while giving diuretics to keep blood pressure in check may work for residents of the United States, it may not be the best option for those living in a country with temperatures in the 90s and water sources that may be unclean.

The next trip to Haiti is planned for October.

For information about the group, e-mail OLMChaitiministry@yahoo.com.

The concert begins at 7:30 p.m.; doors open at 6:45.

Tickets are $20 for adults and $10 for students.

For advance tickets, email OLMChaiticoncert@gmail.com or visit www.brownpapertickets.com. Tickets can also be purchased at the door.

OLMC is at 235 E. State St.