Educating Tenwek House Staff

One of the key objectives of our participation in helping to develop a cardiac surgery program at Tenwek Hospital is to educate and train the Tenwek medical staff so in the future they can become an independent and free-standing cardiac center to service the 600,000 Kipsigis natives that it cares for in the immediate vicinity.

To give you some perspective, when I first came to Tenwek in Nov 2008 the total number of pediatric open heart procedures performed at the pediatric center in Nairobi was 8 - for the entire year.   At the end of our first week of surgery that year we had completed 9 cardiac procedure - more than 1 years worth of procedures for this area.  That was an incredible accomplishment. 

The second Vanderbilt team that was just at Tenwek in Oct 2009 did 13 patients.  One of the key objectives is to not only do the   procedures, but train the medical staff to understand and do the procedures themselves.  On Saturday our Vanderbilt nurses (Rebecca, Kristen and Leah) gave a series of lectures with the support of our Vanderbilt Critical Care Intensivist Dr. Tom. 

In the upper photo Kristen is giving a PowerPoint lecture on EKG Rhythm Recognition.  In  the next photo, Leah is lecturing on Proper Airway Maintenance in the post-op ICU patient.

In the 3rd photo Rebecca is lecturing on the different kinds of Congenital Defects found in children. 

Leah is demonstrating (on Kristen) how to maintain an airway and assist a patient's respiratory status when necessary.  Rebecca taught sessions on Congenital Defects and they each assisted each other along with Dr. Tom in explaining and demonstrating everything they discussed.

The medical staff participation was great, and I have to say I learned a lot in the process.

Here's the entire group that attended on Saturday.  We're off to a great start.