PNG has a good team of bio-medical engineers but they probably aren’t trained to the level they should be.
Russell Lee, project coordinator of Open Heart International, says this is an important area that needs focus on.
Over the years of bringing the Operation Open Heart into PNG, Lee observes gaps in this field which can help a lot if addressed.
To make his point, he elaborated that with a surgery such as an open heart case, high technical equipment are used.
But in PNG, where heat and humidity and power fluctuations are common, maintenance of these equipment is really important.
Hence, there needs to be training of bio-medical team to ensure proper maintenance of this equipment.
He also stressed on the need for sterilisation and cleaning instruments that are re-used. He said that area needs to be enhanced.
“Our (OHI) goal is to contribute to bringing a sterilisation specialist next time we visit, to review how things are being done and work with the local team on how to improve in that area,” he said.
Lee said focus had always been on training doctors.
He emphasised that the need now was to train ancillary team in the medical field relating to cardiac health.
Lee stressed the importance of having skilled nurses in the cardiac intensive care unit, as well as more than one fully trained perfusionist and anesthetician.
He said a new position also is to introduce an intensivist – a physician to specialise in the care of critically ill patients or at the Intensive care unit (ICU).
Already, a young local paediatrician has been appointed to be a paediatric intensivist – and is currently undergoing training to equip him for this.
Lee said the idea is to have more than one of each specialist, in order to keep this service more sustainable.