It’s unbelievable that today was
our second to last day at Roosevelt when it seemed only yesterday we were
looking at the machines and meeting the residents for the first time! Time
really flies by here because our days are so jammed packed and today was no
exception.
Today was our last day to finish up
all equipment repair, cataloging of equipment, writing manuals and translating
troubleshooting guide. Needless to say we had a lot to do to wrap up our work
at Roosevelt to ensure that our final day goes smoothly and we can properly
communicate to staff about the outcome of our work. We started by taking one
last look at the ventilators. We had unfortunately gotten to a stopping point
with many of the vents. For example, there was one Vela vent whose screen and
battery we had fixed. Despite these repairs the vent was still showing symptoms
of internal issues that would require replacing a part. Like the majority of
the equipment we see at Roosevelt, this vent was outdated and the manufacturer
no longer produces the proper parts needed to repair it.
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| Patient bed in the ICU |
Running into various roadblocks,
whether that means: missing parts, having parts stolen, lacking maintenance, or
lacking communication, is the everyday reality of a public hospital in
Guatemala and we hope to improve that in the near future. Broken equipment
accumulates every day in various parts of the hospital and it is difficult to
keep up with the various types of equipment and models. However, we are excited
to know that our work will continue even as we leave Guatemala with the help of
La Universidad del Valle (UVG). This morning we met with Dr. Mejia, Professor
Roberto Sevaria, and two students from the UVG Mechatronics association this
morning to discuss with Dr. Mejia exactly what the partnership would look like
and how it would benefit each of three parties. The meeting was extremely
successful and it was clear everyone left with a common understanding of what
the next steps are. After the meeting we were able to show our UVG guests
around the ICU and also the ER to give them a better idea of exactly what and
whom they’ll be working with. It was great introducing the amazing staff at
Roosevelt to new engineering faces who are already ambitiously thinking of new
ways to improve the hospital including creating an app to track equipment
information that any nurse, volunteer or doctor could update. Every medical professional we have spoken to is extremely enthusiastic about the UVG students.
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| Outside the ER |
After the UVG students left it
was back to Oakland mall to work on manuals, final reports, thank yous,
translations etc until Dr. Barnoya picked us up to go to dinner. We went to
Vesuvio, the same place he took me my first night in Guatemala last year. After
a couple hours of good pizza and a lot of insight from Dr. Barnoya we headed
back to Uxlabil to keep working in the early morning to ensure all our reports
and manuals were ready to hand over…during our last visit to Roosevelt of this
first official rotation of WUGI.
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