SPECIAL REPORT: Arusha college holds the future of bio-medical engineering

Arusha. A patient arrives at a hospital seeking treatment from fever, a common medical condition characterised by high body temperature above a normal range.

 The first thing any medical assistant will do is to go for a thermometre, a devise that measures the temperature. The most common thermometers have been using mercury.

 The technology is still in use, but it has been overtaken by the devices using batteries, those operated by digital means or the radiation-type thermometers which measure the infrared energy emitted by the object (patient), allowing measurement of temperature without contact.

 These are among the medical equipment used for training for the newly-introduced bio-medical engineering course at Arusha Technical College (ATC). The course is one of the new disciplines within a broader technical training programme introduced recently following major reforms undertaken by the 37-year-old college from 2009.

“There is a big demand for bio-medical technicians in the country. All graduates have been absorbed by medical institutions,” said Kefa Mkongwa, one of the instructors in electrical engineering department at the college.

The introduction of the course has also encouraged students - mainly those pursuing electrical engineering training - to build interest in the programme.

Thermometers, including the new generation ones using electricity and other high-tech means, are just a few of the medical equipment that the students in bio-medical engineering are trained to use, operate, repair and maintain.

The others are X-rays, ultra-sound machines, CT scans, those used to measure heart beats, blood pressure, microscopes and a range of others, including refrigerators for preserving medicines and specimen collected.

There is also another one called pulse oximeter, which measures the oxygen level in the (human) body and many others. Besides, the machines or devices, students are also trained on how to use various medical tools and instruments.

Mr Amiri S. Msuya, who teaches electrical engineering at the college says; “Most of the bio-medical equipment use electronics.....digital electronics. Among them are equipment used to measure the blood pressure.”

His colleague, Mr Sithole Mwakatage, says the bio-medical engineering course at ATC was timely because currently there are many hospitals and health care facilities which keep on expanding.

“Unfortunately, for many such facilities there has been no special care of the equipment. This course is relevant to the market where the demand is high”, he told The Citizen on Sunday as he supervised the students in the workshop.

He added: “Today’s hospitals need high tech expertise. We must have experts (bio-medical technicians) who will service or repair the medical equipment and tools. To start with we have to train such technicians. Lack of repairs and proper maintenance is very costly”.

Mr Urbanus Melkior, the head of Electrical Engineering Department at the college sums it all; “Bio-medical training programme has been introduced in order to train technicians who will service hospital equipment”.

The course targets only those students taking electrical engineering subjects. During the first and second year those intending to opt for bio-medical programme or earmarked have to do general subjects in electrical field. It is during the third year, those seen to be performing well, are compelled to specialize in bio-medical equipment. “In most cases specialized training in hospitals around Arusha”, he pointed out. Within a month, at least one week’s training will be done in a hospital.

Currently, ATC has a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with three major hospitals in town for field training for its students. These are St Elizabeth Hospital, Arusha Lutheran Medical Centre (AMLC), Selian Hospital and Mt Meru Regional Hospital.

The first batch for the course of 13 students was enrolled in 2012, followed by the second (21) and third in 2013 (53) and this year respectively. But for Mr Melkior, introduction of bio-medical training in the technical college had an interesting start.

It all started in 2011 when the then Arusha Regional Medical Office Dr. Salash Toure notified ATC that it was experiencing “ a big need in demand” of electrical technicians to maintain its medical equipment.

Even before the college responded, the RMO suggested in his letter; “it is hot time for your college to include in the curricular this kind of cadre among those your institution is producing. Our problem will be solved if your institution takes in account this request”.

According to Dr Toure, who has since retired, Mt Meru, the government-run main referral hospital in the region was short of the cadre. Moreover, there was an acute shortage of swuch technicians across the country “while the demand is continuously increasing”.

The management of ATC did not waste time to act on the proposal. The college had just started major reforms after its status was elevated to a semi-autonomous college under the ministry of Education and Vocational Training.

The programme started the following year (2012) and won accolades from the ministry of Health and Social Welfare.

“This is among the field with high personnel demand in the continent. Tanzania is also having a huge deficit on this cadre as were is not university or college providing training on this field of engineering”, a communication from the ministry to the college rector on November 29, 2012 said.

Among public hospitals very few regional referral and district hospitals have biomedical engineering personnel and, according to the ministry,they need capacities building to cope with healthcare technology changes.

 “Your plan to offer training in biomedical engineering field is good news. We hope it will cope with vast demand in the field without any compromise in quality of healthcare delivery”, a senior ministry official Dr Edwin Mung’ong’o said.

Mr Melkior is comforted by the speed with which the new programme has attracted partners from both within the country and abroad. These include the Dar es Salaam Institute of Technology (DIT), a US-based Beta International and Clemson University also from the US.

Several tutors from ATC have been sent for capacity building training in biomedical engineering in the US while local training has been organized with instructors from the South Carolina-based university.

“We are gratified now. In the past this cadre was not seen to be needed. There were very few electrical equipment. But now most of the equipment, including those for treating diabetes, use electricity”, he said.

The health ministry has also given much support to the programme because of the rapid increase in the number of hospitals, health centres and other medical facilities in Tanzania.

According to Mr Melkior, until recently there were only 35 specialists trained in using, operating, repairing and maintaining biomedical equipment and tools in the countryngineering in the country.

Many of them worked at the Muhimbili National Hospital in Dar es Salaam, KCMC and Buganda Referral Hospitals in Moshi and Mwanza respectively, Kitete Hospital in Tabora for the western zone, Mbeya for the southern highlands and Ligula which serves the southeastern zone.

Biomedical engineering is the application of engineering principles and design concepts to medicine and biology for healthcare purposes (e.g. diagnostic or therapeutic). This field seeks to close the gap between engineering and medicine: It combines the design and problem solving skills of engineering with medical and biological sciences to advance health care treatment, including diagnosis, monitoring, and therapy.

Biomedical engineering has only recently emerged as its own study, compared to many other engineering fields. Such an evolution is common as a new field transitions from being an interdisciplinary specialization among already-established fields, to being considered a field in itself. Much of the work in biomedical engineering consists of research and development, spanning a broad array of subfields.