Dr. Ingrid Buffonge (left) and Lorraine Lewis look at the new equipment donated by Stratians for Strat from funds raised through an online crowd funding campaign in September.
Adapted – Medical practitioners at the Glendon Hospital on Wednesday, November 06, 2013 expressed their gratitude for several new gifts which will make their jobs a little easier.
Local entrepreneur Mrs. Lorraine Lewis on behalf of a group called Stratians for Strat. presented a cardiac monitor defibrillator, a fetal Doppler, and an automatic blood pressure machine to the Casualty Department of the Glendon Hospital in St. John’s.
In September, the group launched an online crowd funding campaign which raised US$6,893.06 after fees to purchase the equipment. To date, US$3,112.95 remain, which Lewis said would go to acquiring additional machines and materials that hospital officials have said they need.
Lewis said in addition to the Stratians for Strat groups, other Montserrat associations in the UK, US and Canada have pledged their support to assist in purchasing what the hospital has indicated it requires to offer quality care to patients.
“…but it doesn’t end here folks,” Lewis said on behalf of the donors. “We’re now in constant communication with you guys on the ground, trying to understand what is needed and what we can do,” she said, continuing, “we still have some money left and over the next coming weeks we hope to present other items to the hospital and it won’t end there this is just the beginning…!”
Chief Surgeon Doctor Braimah Kassim and Nurse Anaesthetist Brenda Daley expressed their gratitude for the equipment. Daley said the Fetal Doppler was of importance to the Obstetrics department.
Lewis added that the next delivery of equipment will be for the Pediatric/Obstetrics Department. “Future funds raised will also be invested in training for the doctors and nurses of the hospital,” she noted.
Dr. Ingrid Buffonge in expressing her share of gratitude, said: “We’re very grateful. It’s a cardiac monitor and it’s also a defibrillators so it can shock the heart back into normal rhythm in patients who are in cardiac arrest or who have very fast rhythms that are not compatible with good health – we can get the heart rate up through this machine until we can get them to a cardiologist, so we are very thankful.”
