Our Work In Mozambique

The following is a list of the work completed by us at the Chicuque Rural Hospital in Mozambique. The trip was a success and the hospital director looks forward to receiving more "WeServe" students in 2010.

Ø Completed an inspection of medical equipment in all departments of the hospital

Ø Created a list of equipment that required restoration, service or maintenance (or any combination thereof)

Ø Diagnosed defects in equipment through inspection, testing and research

Ø Restored equipment to functional state (listed below)

Ø Located and translated manuals (to Portuguese) for future reference of users and maintenance department

Ø Created and posted instructions for:
1) the correct handling of equipment, including blood analyzers, autoclaves, centrifuges, and incubators
2) the correct protocol for procedures related to microscopy, pipetting, sterilization, and centrifugation

Equipment restored:

§ 1 surgical endoscope (Surgery)
§ 1 centrifuge (Laboratory)
§ 1 X-ray ID card scanner (Radiology)
§ 1 ophthalmic microscope (Opthalmology)
§ 1 incubator (Maternity)
§ 1 EKG machine (Medical Ward)
§ 2 ophthalmic machine (Opthalmology)

Equipment requiring replacement parts:

§ 1 incubator (Maternity): requires a new transformer
§ 1 scale (Laboratory): requires a new memory chip
§ 1 autoclave (Surgical): requires a silicone gasket
§ 1 autoclave (Surgical): requires a new heating element

Our final day at Chicuque Rural Hospital

With Dr. Jeremias Franca, Chief Administrator

Alexa posting reference material for the

maintenance of laboratory microscopes

Restored incubator in use

Restored ophthalmic microscope

Work at the Hospital (Post 9)

We have been working at the hospital for over a week now, and only a few more days remain before we fly back to the U.S. Progress has been good, and together with the maintenance team, we have managed to restore over half a dozen pieces of equipment. We still have a lot of work to do and hopefully, a few more machines will be functionalized before we leave. We are meeting with the Administrative Director of the hospital tomorrow to discuss future plans. He is very excited about hosting more “WeServe” students next year