THE Government of the People’s Republic of China through the Chinese Medical Brigade attached to the Linden Hospital Complex (LHC) has donated $6.2M in medical supplies and equipment in an effort to improve healthcare at the LHC. The items were donated last

Wednesday by a team of doctors including the leader of the Chinese Medical Brigade to Linden Dr. Wang Feng. The items which will also alleviate the issue of shortage of some supplies at the hospital, will be disbursed to the Kwakwani Hospital as well as the Upper Demerara Hospital as the need arises. The larger equipment in the list of items donated are Ultrasonic atomisation, atomiser energy chips, syringe pumps, oxygen pumps, infant oxygen hood etc.

Public Relations Officer of the LHC Toshanna Allicock noted that the LHC is extremely grateful for the magnanimous donation by the Government of China which is an annual exercise being done for the past 19 years. Last year, $5M in items were donated and Allicock related that these donations contributed significantly to the improvement of the services, especially emergency services offered at the hospital. Some critical items that were donated last year were anaesthesia machines, portable ultrasound machines and electrocardiogram (EKG) machines.

She said that now, the hospital can offer these services on a 24 hour basis since more doctors and nurses have been trained in operating them. “Since then we have been training doctors and nurses to use these equipment so that we can improve the speed at which we offer EKG testing and ultrasound as well…so instead of waiting on somebody to come and have these EKG testing done, we have the nurses right there who are able to handle that, so we can get faster results,” she noted.

The brigade has already asked the Management to compile a list of items needed for 2019, and Allicock said, she is confident those will be donated as the hospital looks forward to a continued relationship with the Government of China.