Context studies

In this research line, we focus on conducting context research to understand the usage and barriers to the use of medical equipment in healthcare settings all over the world. These studies increase our understanding of local availability, requirements, and the need for innovations. 

 

The lack of medical equipment in many LMICs is a huge contributor to for example the unmet need for provided surgical care. We conduct context research to identify both the gap in availability but also the mismatch between the equipment that is available on the market and the needs of LMICs. This information is valuable in guiding our innovation to ensure we can make an impact in providing clinical care in LMICs, but we also aim to provide the international global health community with valuable information on both availability and barriers to specific medical equipment in these contexts. 

 

We published various studies focusing on the global availability of surgical equipment:

- We studied the availability of general surgical equipment in 9 African countries

-  We studied the availability of laparoscopic equipment in 12 African countries based on surveys with surgical providers and 21 biomedical engineering technicians working in 6 different hospitals across Kenya on their experiences with laparoscopic equipment

-  To understand the root cause of these barriers, we detailed the surgical equipment journey, based on the experiences of biomedical engineering technicians working in Kenya