Guinea

The population of Guinea is estimated at 12.4 million with an average life expectancy of 60.02 years old.¹ In 2011 there were three hospital beds per 10,000 people, suggesting challenges for the population to access inpatient healthcare, including surgery.

At the invitation of the Ministry of Health, SPECT partnered with Mercy Ships from August 2018 - February 2019 to conduct training in sterile processing technique for 22 health care workers from four facilities on board the Africa Mercy. Participants were selected following a needs assessment conducted with the Ministry of Health that identified specific gaps and challenges faced by the facilities. Following the initial training, 15 health care providers were further trained in a trainer-of-trainers model to ensure sustainability and build the capacity of providers who went on to train 35 of their colleagues. In February 2019, SPECT’s facilitator returned to Guinea for additional mentorship and to assess implementation.

"The sterilization process is very important. It is the backbone of safe surgery because the first patient may have a sickness or disease like HIV or hepatitis, so whenever you treat them with surgery and use the same instrument on another patient without the same pathology you can transmit infection through improperly sterilized instruments. Instead of reducing infection, it can be spread further". — Dr. Fode Lansana Camara

¹ GHO | By country | Guinea - statistics summary (2002 - present). (2020). Retrieved from http://apps.who.int/gho/data/node.country.country-GIN?lang=en