Doan was born at a small provincial hospital and sent to the National Hospital of Pediatrics (NHP) in Hanoi due to respiratory failure.
Thiep was born two months premature. He weighs a little
more than three pounds but his condition is improving
under CPAP treatment at the Bac Giang Provincial Hospital. |
A single machine could mean the difference between life and death for 64,000 premature infants born each year in Vietnam. With underdeveloped lungs, these babies suffer from a condition known as respiratory distress syndrome.
Thao and Linh’s son was one of those babies. The hospital where he was born did not have a ventilator to help him breathe, so he was rushed to a larger hospital better equipped to help him. When he arrived it was already too late. The doctors told Thao and Linh that their son could not be saved. Eyes welling up with tears, Thao remembered how it felt to let his baby die. “When they told me to sign the consent form to stop treatment, I could barely hold the pen,” he says. “I cried as I signed the paper. … Until the end of my life, I will never forget that moment.”
Thousands of stories like Thao and Linh’s illustrate the importance of immediate medical care for premature infants suffering from this syndrome. Often that vital treatment requires a Continuous Positive Airway Pressure (CPAP) machine. |
Evans has long understood the importance of
sustainability in medical aid programs. From years of
volunteering in Vietnam before starting KSE Medical,
he learned that donating foreign equipment to poor
hospitals does not remedy a lack of basic medical
technology. If the hospital workers do not have the
knowledge and resources to properly operate and
maintain those foreign machines, then such wellintentioned
efforts are futile. The project is about
"teaching people how to design and develop these for
themselves, how to support them in a spirit of selfsufficiency,"
Evans says.
This is easier said than done. KSE Medical spent three
years developing CPAP machines that met local hospitals'
needs. It began to train workers, monitor the machines'
quality and provide technical support. "It has been the
hardest five working years of my life," Evans says. |
