Setting Up A Clinic In A Foreign Country? How To Do It On A Budget And Still Help Dozens Of Patients
Short-term emergency care clinics in foreign lands are at the heart of several organizations that are trying to bring twenty-first-century healthcare to developing and underdeveloped parts of the globe. If you are a doctor, nurse practitioner or nurse who wants to lead your own group of medical professionals into unchartered territory to provide care in a foreign country, then you will need affordable medical equipment you can take with you. Here is how you can do this on a budget and still help dozens of patients who desperately need good healthcare.
Buy Refurbished Critical Care Equipment
Refurbished equipment is used equipment that has been rebuilt or had parts replaced so that it is fully functional again. Typically, it is not the latest or greatest models of equipment, but it still functions and does exactly what you need it to do--save lives and treat injuries. Some of the equipment you can buy from sellers of refurbished medical equipment includes:
- Ventilators
- Heart rate monitors
- Blood oxygen monitors
- Nasogastric tube feeders
- Kidney dialysis machines
- Plasma and blood collection machines
A large majority of this equipment may not be found where your group is headed, and if you can afford most of these items via a refurbished equipment program, then you can really save some lives.
Shop Army Thrift
Cots for injured and sick patients who cannot move on their own, as well as triage beds, can be found via your army thrift store. Army cots are often sold there and are very reasonably priced. The tight canvas cradles and supports patients while allowing wounds and wound drains to leak right through. The canvas on these cots also will not stick to wounds, which could cause pain when the patients are moved or rolled. You may also find a lot of military-grade surplus bandages for cheap.
Engage Pharmaceutical Companies to Get Free or Reduced-Cost Medicines
Pharmaceutical companies may be coaxed into helping your cause. You will need to appeal to their humanitarian side by listing all of the good publicity and benefits of donating medicines and antibiotics to your mission. At the very least, some of the pharmaceutical companies may be willing to drastically reduce the costs of the medicines you seek so that a small portion of your budget can pay for the more expensive and difficult to come by medicines (like antivirals for the treatment of HIV/AIDS or cancer treatment medications). If the pharmaceutical companies are willing to help low-income patients in the U.S., you may be able to engage these companies to give the same medicines to those in need in other countries.
Contact a local provider, such as Heartland Medical Specialties Inc., for further assistance.