Medical Design and Outsourcing

  • Home
  • Medical Device Business
    • Mergers & Acquisitions
    • Financial
    • Regulatory
  • Applications
    • Cardiovascular
    • Devices
    • Imaging
    • Implantables
    • Medical Equipment
    • Orthopedic
    • Surgical
  • Technologies
    • Contract Manufacturing
    • Components
    • Electronics
    • Extrusions
    • Materials
    • Motion Control
    • Prototyping
    • Pumps
    • Tubing
  • Med Tech Resources
    • DeviceTalks Tuesdays
    • Digital Editions
    • eBooks
    • Manufacturer Search
    • Medical Device Handbook
    • MedTech 100 Index
    • Podcasts
    • Print Subscription
    • The Big 100
    • Webinars / Digital Events
    • Whitepapers
    • Video
  • 2022 Leadership in MedTech
    • 2022 Leadership Voting!
    • 2021 Winners
    • 2020 Winners
  • Women in Medtech

Study: One-Third of Hospitals in Developing World Lack Running Water

June 22, 2016 By Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health

A study of 430 hospitals in the developing world found that more than one-third lacked running water, a deficiency that can lead to unsanitary conditions for patients in general and dangerous conditions for those who need surgery.

The research, led by the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health and published online in the Journal of Surgical Research, points to larger deficiencies in the health care systems in many of the world’s low- and middle-income countries and highlights the need to focus on basic infrastructure in order to prevent the spread of disease and improve health outcomes there.

“Running water is something we so take for granted and it doesn’t exist in a third of hospitals in these countries,” says one of the study’s leaders, Adam L. Kushner, MD, MPH, an adjunct professor at the Bloomberg School. “Instead of water just being there, some hospitals truck in water or collect it in rain barrels, with no guarantee of its cleanliness. Without clean water, there is no way to clean surgeons’ hands or instruments, wash gowns and sheets or clean wounds to prevent or reduce infections.”

For their study, the researchers analyzed published research related to surgical capacity in low- and middle-income countries. They identified 19 surgical capacity studies undertaken between 2009 and 2015 that included information on water availability covering 430 hospitals in 19 nations. They found that 147 of the 430 hospitals lacked continuous running water (34 percent). These ranged from less than 20 percent with running water in Liberia to more than 90 percent in Bangladesh and Ghana. 

Many people in the world – an estimated 700 million – live without access to water; half of those without water live in sub-Saharan Africa. Lack of access to water and sanitation has a significant negative impact on health care provision, including surgical care, the researchers note.

Hospitals without running water often truck in water – at great expense – or use rainwater. While helpful in the rainy season, rain barrels often run dry during the dry season. This water is not only needed for surgery, it is needed to keep patients and rooms clean during other parts of their hospital stays. The study didn’t address access to drinking water.

Without water, Kushner says, hospitals cannot conduct surgery, despite the large unmet surgical needs in these poor nations.

“Hopefully, people aren’t operating in those conditions, but what do you do if a woman shows up in obstructed labor and needs an emergency C-section and it’s the dry season and the rain barrel is empty,” Kushner says. “You can’t operate with dirty instruments, but if you don’t she’s going to die. This is the sort of dilemma that surgeons in these hospitals face.”

Kushner says running water is but one element of ensuring that communities have access to good health care.

“In order to provide basic health care, you need a functioning system and running water is part of that,” he says. “It shows the deficiencies in the health systems in general in those countries.”

Kushner says there needs to be a greater push for improving water access for people globally. He says that nations whose hospitals often lack access to running water – such as Burundi with just under 32 percent – might be able to learn from strategies used by their neighbors, such as Rwanda with more than 83 percent, to build water infrastructure.

“Water Accessibility at Hospitals in Low- and Middle-Income Countries: Implications for Improving Access to Safe Surgical Care” was written by Sagar S. Chawla, Shailvi Gupta, Frankline M. Onchiri, Elizabeth B. Habermann, Adam L. Kushner and Barclay T. Stewart.

The study was funded in part by a grant from the Fogarty International Center at the National Institutes of Health.

(Photo Credit – Home Page: Jennifer Brooks re: Lungi Government Hospital in Lungi, Sierra Leone)

Related Articles Read More >

Logos of Creo Medical and Intuitive
Creo Medical inks collaboration agreement with Intuitive
Lazurite ArthroFree wireless surgical camera system Minnetronix Medical
How Minnetronix Medical helped Lazurite with its wireless surgical camera
Medtronic Hugo robot-assisted surgery system
The road to a robot: Medtronic’s development process for its Hugo RAS system
A portrait of Stryker executive Siddarth Satish
How Stryker includes users for product design in the digital age

DeviceTalks Weekly.

May 27, 2022
Quick message - No DTW podcast, but plenty else to listen to over this weekend and next week.
See More >

MDO Digital Edition

Digital Edition

Subscribe to Medical Design & Outsourcing. Bookmark, share and interact with the leading medical design engineering magazine today.

MEDTECH 100 INDEX

Medtech 100 logo
Market Summary > Current Price
The MedTech 100 is a financial index calculated using the BIG100 companies covered in Medical Design and Outsourcing.
DeviceTalks

DeviceTalks is a conversation among medical technology leaders. It's events, podcasts, webinars and one-on-one exchanges of ideas & insights.

DeviceTalks

New MedTech Resource

Medical Tubing

Enewsletter Subscriptions

Enewsletter Subscriptions

MassDevice

Mass Device

The Medical Device Business Journal. MassDevice is the leading medical device news business journal telling the stories of the devices that save lives.

Visit Website
MDO ad
Medical Design and Outsourcing
  • MassDevice
  • DeviceTalks
  • MedTech 100 Index
  • Medical Tubing + Extrusion
  • Drug Delivery Business News
  • Drug Discovery & Development
  • Pharmaceutical Processing World
  • R&D World
  • About Us/Contact
  • Advertise With Us
  • Subscribe to Print Magazine
  • Subscribe to E-newsletter
  • Attend our Monthly Webinars
  • Listen to our Weekly Podcasts
  • Join our DeviceTalks Tuesdays Discussion

Copyright © 2022 WTWH Media, LLC. All Rights Reserved. Site Map | Privacy Policy | RSS

Search Medical Design & Outsourcing

  • Home
  • Medical Device Business
    • Mergers & Acquisitions
    • Financial
    • Regulatory
  • Applications
    • Cardiovascular
    • Devices
    • Imaging
    • Implantables
    • Medical Equipment
    • Orthopedic
    • Surgical
  • Technologies
    • Contract Manufacturing
    • Components
    • Electronics
    • Extrusions
    • Materials
    • Motion Control
    • Prototyping
    • Pumps
    • Tubing
  • Med Tech Resources
    • DeviceTalks Tuesdays
    • Digital Editions
    • eBooks
    • Manufacturer Search
    • Medical Device Handbook
    • MedTech 100 Index
    • Podcasts
    • Print Subscription
    • The Big 100
    • Webinars / Digital Events
    • Whitepapers
    • Video
  • 2022 Leadership in MedTech
    • 2022 Leadership Voting!
    • 2021 Winners
    • 2020 Winners
  • Women in Medtech