Biomedical Engineering Program
For the first time this year, our team delivered an intensive 4-day biomedical engineering (BME) training program in Lilongwe, Malawi. This program was co-designed with the leadership of the Lilongwe Institute of Orthopaedics and Neurosurgery (LION) to ensure it was addressing relevant and useful topics that would benefit technicians, engineers, and the local community.
The pilot BME program was delivered in conjunction with the larger Pangea Global Health Education nursing and medical programs in Lilongwe and we are extremely grateful to the John James Foundation for their grant which allowed this program to be piloted.
We had 15 attendees with various levels of experience attend and in addition to the education component, each program attendee was provided with a set of tools and testing equipment to support the maintenance and operation of hospital equipment.
We hope this program will continue to have a wider impact on the Malawian community; with not only the biomedical engineers who participated in the program benefiting, but also their colleagues with whom they are able to share knowledge and expertise. As practice is improved, there is a longer-lasting impact on the health system as a whole; leading to better outcomes for Malawian patients into the future.
“The program was so good, it could help improve patient outcomes by imparting knowledge in the staff who are in contact with the patient and equipment – now we have the knowledge of how the equipment works, to connect the machines to the patient properly, and if the equipment fails the nurses will know who to report it to” – Mr Lameck Chimango, Snr Biomedical Engineer at Kamuzu Central Hospital.
