Johannesburg – A volunteer doctor working with the dedicated management of the hospital, the community and donors has brought new hope to a rural health facility in Mpumalanga.
Dr Mary-Anne Hartley, a volunteer with the Tshemba Foundation, was sent to Tintswalo Hospital in Acornhoek to share her expertise and also played a key role in renovating the hospital.
The 423-bed public hospital gets up to 500 patients a day and caters to about half a million local residents.
Having arrived at the hospital in March this year, she did not only manage to help renovate the facility but also introduced a life-saving device.
The portable ultrasound tool can be used by any doctor at a district-health level to not only support women during their pregnancies but also to pick up many other medical problems including kidney ailments and tuberculosis.
The Pretoria-born Hartley, who is based in Switzerland, where she runs a lab at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology that focuses on artificial intelligence (AI) for resourced- limited settings in healthcare, left the hospital at the end of July in a much better shape than she found it.
Hartley said that the portable device, which uses AI, plugs into a cellphone.
“The probe is a versatile tool compared to the big ultrasound machines you usually see. It is cheap … It is useful and gives access to diagnostics to a resourced limited setting,” she said.
Hartley said the device provided data that fed into their research by taking ultrasound images and using AI to automatically interpret those images. “We try to use AI to allow technology to be used in a standardised way even when there are no experts there … We try to democratise access to accuracy and expertise in predictive medicine, making sure accuracy is equal for everyone, data is collected ethically and ensuring it is sustainable and directly beneficial to the patient.”
She said that it was also non-invasive and was tested at one of Switzerland’s five university hospitals with 400 people that had pneumonia and Covid-19.
CEO of the hospital Merriam Moyimane said before this technology, patients had to travel far sometimes to get tested and for ultrasounds to be performed.
“Also, Dr Hartley taught our doctors how to use these ultrasound devices or AI … We are one of the few hospitals blessed to have this skill and await for the Department [of Health] to approve the research collected from it. Imagine, you don’t need big machines – just this small device that gives you scans, diagnosis and then a treatment plan is devised,” said Moyimane.
On the renovating front, Hartley said thanks to the tenacity of the hospital staff and Moyimane, noting that they were able, with the help of donors, to create a proper emergency area.
“They didn’t have triage in place … people got lost on the premises. The casualty sign was a paper sign that most missed.”
Hartley said the government did not help at all despite their calls for help. “I started a blog to raise funds and received donations from across the world.
“The roof leaked, which meant all mattresses were wet. We were donated curtains, we painted and fixed plugs and re-did the floors and roof, beautiful new beds – all on a shoestring budget. We put up new emergency signs and even painted murals for the children.”
Moyimane praised Hartley’s efforts and said that having first been under the Limpopo health administration and then being moved to the Mpumalanga section, renovations meant to be done in 2008 did not happen.
“When Dr Hartley came, I explained the vision to improve our hospital. It would not have been possible without her efforts and physical hard work.
“We are not done, and she continues to do fundraising to complete the whole hospital.
“We have drastically improved the casualty/emergency section and I’m forever grateful. “She has uplifted the spirit of the staff as well as that of the community,” said Moyimane.
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