We had the pleasure to help the Biomed Manager working for the International Humanitarian Organisation Doctors Without Borders (Médecins Sans Frontières) in Sierra Leone.
They are supporting the Government Hospital of Kenema, helping the local Biomedical-Engineer to keep the medical devices in function. In this mentioned hospital there are several Oxygen Concentrators that were unfortunately out of service and the hospital did not have any User or Maintenance Manual.
Even tough the devices had not been sold through O2-O3, we were nonetheless able to find an Instruction Manual for the specified Oxygen Concentrators models, that we forwarded to the Team there, for which they were most thankful, because the much needed devices were just sitting there without anyone knowing how to operate them and maintain them.
Sierra Leone has one of the world’s highest maternal and child mortality ratio. An already fragile health system, and a dire lack of health workers, caused in part by the 2014 Ebola outbreak, have also led to a drastic rise in the number of deaths among children under five.
Mortality estimates were already one among the highest in the world for children under five and researchers have predicted that child mortality could, according to the United Nations, increase to 114 for every 1,000 live births, a further 74 per cent due to the loss of health personnel during the Ebola outbreak.
Between May 2014, when the first case of Ebola was recorded in Sierra Leone, and early 2016, when the country was declared Ebola-free, the epidemic claimed 3,956 lives, including seven per cent of the country’s health workers.
This is why Médecins Sans Frontières has made the professional development of local health workers one of its top priorities in Sierra Leone. Training was provided to 160 Médecins Sans Frontières hospital staff in Kenema district in 2018. During its first phase, the Médecins Sans Frontières hospital in Kenema provided a laboratory and blood bank, alongside paediatric services that include an emergency room, a paediatric intensive care unit, an inpatient therapeutic feeding centre, a general paediatric ward and an isolation ward for suspected Lassa fever cases.
Update:
The hospital is open for patient services from March 2019 in Hangha town providing quality emergency health care to under five children to reduce child morbidity and mortality. In the future a maternity will be added to help tackle the high maternal mortality ratio in the district.
