SHELBY, N.C. -- It is a tough time to be in the medical profession and try to provide help for the people of Haiti.
Some doctors from the Charlotte area are already on the island but, for the most part, out of touch, while others who want to go, can't.
Lumiere Medical Ministries in Gastonia has a list of surgeons and other medical personnel who have volunteered to go and are ready to leave, but there are no flights for them.
The U.S. has now restricted airspace at the Port-Au-Prince airport and commercial airlines won't be able to fly in until Friday of next week.
"At the moment, as we speak, it is impossible to get them there," said Hank Haskins, CEO of Lumiere. "If we had a charter plane to take them, right now we couldn't get clearance into Port-Au-Prince."
In Shelby, two doctors from Shelby Surgical Associates are already at the border of Haiti and the Dominican Republic, but the office manager, Jean Costner, said she has had little contact with them since the earthquake.
She said she had one brief text message shortly after the quake saying doctors Michael Barringer and Doug Hobson had not been injured. Costner said she was, "very concerned till we heard that they were OK and they are going about their business now that they went down there for."
Barringer and Hobson are two of four doctors from Cleveland County who volunteer their time on the island of Hispaniola to help those who need medical attention. They have been there since last Friday working near the border.
In a brief e-mail Thursday, Barringer said the doctors had treated one patient from the earthquake and consulted on another.
"Everything is fine where we are located," Barringer wrote to Costner. "Please pray for the people of Haiti. Since they have so little, an event such as this is more than devastating."
The Shelby doctors hope to return home this weekend through the Dominican Republic.
Lumiere is still hoping to get its doctors to a hospital in Port -Au-Prince that the group supports as quickly as possible.
"It is a difficult situation and we are going to have to work through it and be patient," said CEO Haskins.
