Education is most sustainable global health solution

Operating room in Hospital Luis Felipe Moncada

One of the two operating rooms at Hospital Luis Felipe Moncada, where power surges often made the availability of electricity unpredictable.

Published August 4, 2014, last updated on October 5, 2017 under Voices of DGHI

By Betsy Asma, MSc-GH Student
Engineering World Health Summer Institute
Written July 16th, 2014

As my Nicaraguan summer adventure comes to a close, it made me reflect on all that I have accomplished while here. Initial thoughts of the slower “Nicaraguan” working style made me panic, but as I compiled a list, I realized the large amount of work we accomplished, and that work doesn’t necessarily always have to be tangible. As repair technicians at Hospital Luis Felipe Moncada, Katie and I managed to work on:

  • repairing pediatric nebulizers, centrifuges, & suction machines,
  • replacing light bulbs and circuitry in microscopes,
  • assembling infant incubators and re-wiring  infant radiant warmers,
  • scrubbing into the operating room to repair wall electricity and replace fuses,
  • repairing, sanding and painting IV poles and an operating room bed
  • troubleshooting countless machines, error messages and power supplies,
  • translating manuals, documents, buttons, alarm codes and more!
  • Interviewing staff about how we can help make future improvements,
  • And countless other repairs, conversations and teaching moments-both for us and staff!

Since tomorrow is our last day at the hospital, I can’t help but reflect on sustainability and question “What impact has been made after we leave?” It’s important to point out that the Nicaraguan public hospital system was efficiently run prior to our arrival and will continue to run with our departure. That’s not to say that our trip did not have an impact-we fixed machines that would otherwise remained broken or in the trash, we assembled incubators and infant warmers that came with English instructions, we translated documents, error codes and buttons into Spanish.

But this experience has stressed to me the importance of sustainability. The most important tasks we did were not necessarily machine repairs but education.  We did a lot of teaching so when equipment breaks, and we have returned to the states, local staff is knowledgeable to make repairs. I was completely blown away by the complete ingenuity of the hospital engineering staff using everyday supplies for extraordinary fixes. In the event of another failure, it’s critical to leave instructions and knowledge with the technicians so they can repair once we leave. Our engineering degrees were fairly useless and really overshadowed by our knowledge of English and how valuable it was for translations of manuals, so in the future, hospital staff can troubleshoot, repair and fully sustain their hospitals.

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