MGHD 2024

Introduction: Biomedical equipment is crucial for maintaining high healthcare standards and ensuring timely patient care. Effective management of this equipment is vital, especially in low—and middle-income countries like Rwanda. This study assesses the availability and functionality of biomedical equipment and equipment management practices in the operating room (OR) and post-anaesthesia care unit (PACU) at Kabgayi, Kirehe, Kibogora, Butaro, and Kacyiru district hospitals in Rwanda. Methods: A multi-facility-based cross-sectional survey assessed biomedical equipment availability, functionality, and management in five district hospitals in Rwanda. Data was collected using i) a medical equipment checklist and ii) a hospital biomedical management practices checklist. Both tools were adapted from the policy and guidelines of biomedical equipment management practices in Rwanda. Key measures were summarized using descriptive statistics. Results: This study’s findings revealed that the five hospitals have a combination of 16 ORs, three PACUs, and 226 pieces of equipment. The overall availability of essential biomedical equipment in all hospital ORs was 45%. Only 5 of 19 equipment types meet the requirements set by the Rwanda health care service package list for public facilities. The overall functionality of the available equipment in the ORs and PACUs was high at 96%. However, it was noted that the government of Rwanda funded 42% of the available equipment, and the acquisition of another 42% of the surveyed equipment could not be tracked due to poor inventory management. The results also revealed an overall average adherence of 65.8% to biomedical equipment management practices across the hospitals surveyed. Conclusion: Our study found that the surveyed hospitals have low availability of biomedical equipment in their operating rooms (ORs) but a commendable functionality rate. The study also identified significant gaps in adherence to biomedical equipment acquisition and maintenance practices. Furthermore, it highlighted major issues with inventory management at the district hospital facility, as a large portion of the available equipment in the ORs and PACUs could not be properly accounted for. We, therefore, recommend that the MOH and partners pay closer attention to the availability of essential biomedical equipment while implementing a robust regular audit to assess the adherence to maintenance and management practices, including asset management. Keywords: Biomedical Equipment, Availability, Functionality, Adherence.