We are proud to announce that we have officially
repaired 1 ECG and 3 respiratory ventilators!
We started our third day working
in Roosevelt hospital like the days before, arriving by 8AM to set-up and immediately diving into work. Today we took on the ECG first. After running more diagnostics and
tests using a manual we had found online, we were sure that the machine internally was functioning properly reassuring our assumption that there was a problem
with leads and/or electrodes. Instead of testing the ECG on a patient like
yesterday we sacrificed Ananya as our test patient. We completed a successful
test, confirmed our results with one of our favorite residents, Carlos, and
were able to speak with nurses about the future use of the ECG. We had the opportunity to review exactly what issues we encountered and how to
maintain the ECG in the future especially in terms of sanitation and correct preparatory measures. We hope to assist in the transition of Roosevelt Hospital towards the usage of single usage electrodes. It is vital that our efforts are sustainable. Within
minutes she took the ECG away to use for the rest of the day.
Within
a half hour of repairing the first ECG we received another. This new model was
extremely different from the first. It has a completely different manufacturer with
buttons and electronic readings all in English-a clear sign it had been donated
to Roosevelt from another country. The electronic leads were clearly damaged
and we are in search for new leads and desperate for a manual, we’ll see what
we can turn up.
Of
course, that left us to continue our work on the ventilators. After a couple
hours and a visit from Hector, a maintenance worker who greeted us warmly and
confirmed that creating an organizational system for equipment and parts would
be incredibly useful and beneficial, we were stuck. We had not anticipated
working on ventilators at all and therefore weren’t entirely confident whether
our repairs were sufficient to safely test the ventilator on a patient. We were
still receiving an error code but all alarms had stopped. Mainor, a respiratory
therapist graciously agreed to help us out and confirmed that the vent was
ready to go and the error was solely found because we didn’t have a patient
connected. This was the case with 2 other ventilators as well meaning a couple
of things:
1 1) we
successfully repaired 3 ventilators
2 2) There
are 3 new ventilators for the hospital to use (which is vital because they are
severely lacking vents and many residents are stuck hand ventilating patients
all night)
3 3) We now
have more knowledge we can use to repair the other ventilators and to share
with staff, to again ensure our work is sustainable.
We left the hospital pretty
content and ready to watch the world cup with the residents. They are a great
group to hang out with but also to learn from. On our way there we passed the
observation rooms outside of the ICU where Carlos pointed out a man who had
been there for 7 years. He requires an automatic ventilator that the hospital
cannot supply so sits in the same bed hooked to machinery watching soccer day after day. His
quality of life has been so severely reduced as a result of a lack of resources
and funding. Also as we were leaving, we noticed that every car is stopped
before exiting hospital grounds to ensure that there are no residents or staff
that are stealing equipment or drugs from the hospital.
We’re all pleased and excited about our day. It is an incredible
feeling to know we’ve already made an impact after three days working in
Roosevelt and having success fixing equipment really serves as a motivating
force to keep working, researching and getting our hands dirty everyday.
Besides, Argentina is moving on to the final game, what else could we ask for?
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