Over a decade after a partnership between Northumberland’s’s Hexham General Hospital and the Kilimanjaro Christian Medical Centre (KCMC) in Tanzania was launched with a vision to revolutionise healthcare delivery to the Tanzanian people.
Two of the key players, Colin Dobbyne, chairman of visual communications specialists, OR Networks, and Liam Horgan, consultant surgeon, director of the Northern Skills Institute at Hexham General Hospital, and head laparoscopic surgeon at the Royal College of Surgeons, were among a team recently returned from a visit to KCMC to see how the partnership’s laparoscopic element is progressing. The laparoscopic development project (HEJ – January 2011) began in 2004 when Liam Horgan performed what was reportedly Tanzania’s first laparoscopic cholecystectomy. The patient’s short, relatively painless recovery, with minimal risk of infection, proved keyhole surgery would be ideal for patients at KCMC, if only surgeons there had the necessary equipment and access to training. While equipment could be provided, training was an issue, since UK surgeons could only realistically visit for one week a year, and the Tanzanian surgeons needed ongoing help and support. To overcome this, Colin Dobbyne developed a video link which, despite poor and unreliable internet provision, allowed live video mentoring of the Tanzanian surgeons from their UK counterparts while operations were underway. Laparoscopic surgery thus began to be undertaken regularly and successfully at KCMC. Earlier this year the link was improved with the Tanzanian Telecommunications Company’s (TTCL) installation of a fibre optic link. This provides considerably faster internet, facilitating much higher quality images, and gives scope to include several different training scenarios. In March Colin Dobbyne (pictured centre with specialist laparoscopic nurse sister Sue Colley, KCMC surgeons and IT staff, and TTCL personnel) and Liam Horgan flew out to see the new link’s launch and catch up on progress with the telementoring project. Colin Dobbyne said: “The entire project has been a huge success. The video link gave the KCMC surgeons the confidence to perform keyhole surgery since their mentor was watching live and offering support and advice when required. Ironically, the real evidence of success is that, as the surgeons become more experienced, there is less need to use the video link for mentoring. In fact, the project has worked so well that Dr Kondo, the lead surgeon, has now performed over 200 procedures.”
