New equipment helps K.H.M.H. neurosurgery unit
Over one hundred thousand dollars in surgical equipment was today donated to the Karl Heusner Memorial Hospital. The new gear, earmarked for the recently created neurosurgery department, came courtesy of the Foundation for International Education in Neurological Surgery. Belize’s first neurosurgeon, Dr. Joel Cervantes, says the equipment will go a long way towards helping Belizeans all over the country.
Dr. Joel Cervantes, Neurosurgeon
?Even though we have had minor contributions from FIENS before, this is the biggest donation that FIENS has done. This is probably the product of the last six years of canvassing with these guys, corresponding on a nearly day to day basis. The impact it will have in Belize is very important because we can start keeping our monies at home and have people take these surgeries, these very high tech neurological surgeries, here in Belize.?
?The problem has been that we?ve picked up on is that many patients get sent to the Karl Heusner Memorial Hospital when these can be dealt with at the regional hospital. This is perhaps because the doctors on call might be a bit scared out front. So we have written these protocols, which is for head trauma and spine trauma, so that precisely we educate the doctors in the regional hospitals, so as to save money they will send what needs to be sent and not expose a patient unnecessarily to being transferred to this institution. That way regional hospitals can take care of patients with low grade trauma, trauma that does not need medical attention from a neurosurgeon or surgical attention from us. But injuries that are moderate or very high risk will have to be transferred to this institution as such for our treatment.?
Handing over the equipment on behalf of FIENS (FEENS) was Dr. Thomas Mehalick of Portland, Maine, who spent the last month in Belize helping K.H.M.H.’s neurosurgery unit get started. Mehalick says he already has another project in the works.
Dr. Thomas Mehalick, Neurosurgeon
?We need an operating microscope, and I just sent in the application today to the World Federation of Neurological Surgeons in Switzerland and hopefully they will be able to donate a refurbished microscope at approximately ten thousand U.S. Normally these are much more expensive to one hundred and fifty to two hundred thousand U.S. So we are hopeful that that will be part of the surgical armamentarium here in the hospital.?
The neurosurgical unit at the K.H.M.H. is already functional and doctors recently performed a complicated spinal surgery on a man from Orange Walk.
