Ot­to Car­ring­ton

From a hos­pi­tal the­atre at the Sev­enth Day Ad­ven­tist Com­mu­ni­ty Hos­pi­tal in Co­corite to dis­as­ter zones across the globe, Dr Reynold Agard speaks with the ur­gency of a man who has seen both cri­sis and re­cov­ery up close.

“My name is Dr Reynold Agard from Trinidad and To­ba­go,” he says sim­ply, speak­ing in the mid­dle of an ac­tive med­ical mis­sion giv­ing the gift of sight to thou­sands of Trinidad and To­ba­go cit­i­zens.

Born in Good­wood, To­ba­go, and raised in Trinidad, Agard de­scribes him­self as a “true Trin­bag­on­ian”, but his work has tak­en him far be­yond the Caribbean. To­day, he serves as pres­i­dent of HANDS In­ter­na­tion­al, a glob­al hu­man­i­tar­i­an med­ical or­gan­i­sa­tion based in Lo­ma Lin­da, Cal­i­for­nia.

“I joined the or­gan­i­sa­tion six months af­ter they start­ed,” he re­calls. “I be­came their med­ical di­rec­tor. And for the past 14 years, I’ve been the pres­i­dent of HANDS In­ter­na­tion­al.”

Over that pe­ri­od, HANDS has grown in­to a co-or­di­nat­ed in­ter­na­tion­al med­ical out­reach net­work, de­ploy­ing vol­un­teer spe­cial­ists in­to dis­as­ter zones and un­der­served com­mu­ni­ties across the world.

“We do med­ical mis­sions across the globe,” Agard ex­plains.

“When­ev­er there is a dis­as­ter like Haiti, Nepal, hur­ri­canes—we just fin­ished Ja­maica where we spent three months. When there’s a dis­as­ter, we go in with med­ical sup­plies, but al­so food, cloth­ing, and hu­man­i­tar­i­an sup­port.”

Teams in­clude emer­gency physi­cians, sur­geons, pae­di­a­tri­cians, gy­nae­col­o­gists, oph­thal­mol­o­gists, and den­tists.

“We take every spec­trum so we can help coun­tries get back on their feet,” he says.

It is in Trinidad and To­ba­go, how­ev­er, where one of HANDS In­ter­na­tion­al’s most am­bi­tious cur­rent in­ter­ven­tions is un­fold­ing: a high-vol­ume cataract surgery pro­gramme de­signed to re­store sight to thou­sands.

At the cen­tre is a col­lab­o­ra­tion with in­ter­na­tion­al­ly recog­nised sur­geons and lo­cal health part­ners.

“One of the busiest cataract sur­geons in the world is work­ing with us,” Agard notes. “He runs a project in In­dia called Eyes for In­dia, and he works across Ghana, Sier­ra Leone, Ethiopia. He is in de­mand glob­al­ly.”

The med­ical goal is clear and mea­sur­able.

“Our tar­get is ap­prox­i­mate­ly 4,000 cataract surg­eries if we can,” he says. “Be­cause we know the need is here.”

Agard breaks down the pro­ce­dure in sim­ple terms.

“When cataracts de­vel­op, the lens be­comes opaque, like look­ing through frost­ed glass,” he ex­plains. “When we re­place that lens, peo­ple see again. Colours be­come sharp­er. Night blind­ness im­proves. It changes qual­i­ty of life.”

But the op­er­a­tion is on­ly part of a larg­er sys­tem of care. Screen­ing and pre-op­er­a­tive test­ing have proven to be one of the biggest lo­gis­ti­cal chal­lenges.

“We were hop­ing peo­ple would al­ready be screened be­fore ar­riv­ing,” he ad­mits. “But many could not af­ford the cost of screen­ing, so we had to ad­just.”

That ad­just­ment has slowed through­put but not com­mit­ment.

“In­stead of go­ing out in the evening, we are op­er­at­ing or scan­ning late in­to the night,” he says. “We are here to work our best.”

Teams from In­dia and oth­er part­ner coun­tries have been work­ing ex­tend­ed hours to meet de­mand.

“Our team is very ded­i­cat­ed,” Agard says.

“We come ear­ly, leave late, and try to see as many peo­ple as pos­si­ble.”

The mis­sion has al­so re­quired co­or­di­na­tion across mul­ti­ple lo­cal in­sti­tu­tions, in­clud­ing the Sev­enth-day Ad­ven­tist Com­mu­ni­ty Hos­pi­tal, the Min­istry of Health, and state agen­cies.

Sup­port has al­so come from im­mi­gra­tion, cus­toms, na­tion­al se­cu­ri­ty, and health au­thor­i­ties to fa­cil­i­tate the vis­it­ing teams and equip­ment.

“We are de­light­ed,” Agard says.

“This is our coun­try, and we are here to serve the peo­ple.”

He al­so em­pha­sis­es the im­por­tance of part­ner­ship be­tween pri­vate, faith-based, and pub­lic health sys­tems in en­abling large-scale care de­liv­ery.

For Agard, the work car­ries per­son­al mean­ing.

“Char­i­ty be­gins at home,” he says. “That is why I am pas­sion­ate about bring­ing back help to Trinidad.”

What be­gan as a glob­al hu­man­i­tar­i­an call­ing has be­come, in this mo­ment, a deeply lo­cal in­ter­ven­tion—bring­ing to­geth­er in­ter­na­tion­al ex­per­tise and na­tion­al need.

“We are just hap­py to de­liv­er,” he adds qui­et­ly. “When the ban­dages come off and peo­ple see colours again, that’s the mo­ment it all makes sense.”