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Friday, July 11, 2025

Better heart care at EWMSC

...as 16 tech­nol­o­gists com­plete train­ing at Johns Hop­kins

by

20120310

Pa­tients can ex­pect im­proved de­liv­ery of car­dio­vas­cu­lar (heart/blood ves­sel) health­care ser­vices at Er­ic Williams Med­ical Sci­ences Com­plex (EWM­SC), Mt Hope, from 16 tech­nol­o­gists. They honed their skills via a Car­diac Catheri­sa­tion and Elec­tro­phys­i­ol­o­gy (elec­tri­cal im­puls­es) skills train­ing pro­gramme. It was a col­lab­o­ra­tive ef­fort among John Hop­kins' car­di­ol­o­gy fac­ul­ty, car­di­ol­o­gy con­sul­tants at the EWM­SC, and the Trinidad and To­ba­go Health Sci­ences.

Sev­en young women were among 16 peo­ple who grad­u­at­ed from the 13-month pro­gramme which in­volved the­o­ret­i­cal and prac­ti­cal as­pects. On Thurs­day, they were treat­ed to a sump­tu­ous din­ner in­clud­ing veg­etable casse­role and roast­ed beef topped with rose­mary sprigs by health­care pro­fes­sion­als from the Johns Hop­kins car­di­ol­o­gy fac­ul­ty at a grad­u­a­tion cer­e­mo­ny. It took place in a cosy room at Hy­att Re­gency Ho­tel, Wright­son Road, Port-of-Spain.

Among those present were Lisa Gra­ham, co-di­rec­tor Catheri­sa­tion Train­ing Pro­gramme, Eliz­a­beth Boat­man, ad­min­is­tra­tor Trinidad and To­ba­go Health Sci­ences Ini­tia­tive, Car­dio­vas­cu­lar Ser­vices, Dr Tri­cia Cum­mings and nurse Mary Alexan­der. Mary Pea­cock, co-di­rec­tor Car­diac Catheri­sa­tion Pro­gramme, Johns Hop­kins In­sti­tute, Bal­ti­more, Mary­land, laud­ed the stu­dents for par­tic­i­pat­ing in and com­plet­ing the in­tern­ship.

She ex­pressed op­ti­mism grad­uands would "con­tin­ue their gi­ant ef­forts to­wards a bet­ter fu­ture in health­care. Grad­u­ates are hope­ful there is recog­ni­tion and re­spect for their ef­forts." She re­mind­ed them al­though they have come a long way, there was still a lot of work to be done.

Pea­cock said: "There are ob­sta­cles to climb, de­lays to pa­tient­ly en­dure, new things to learn, old things to re­learn, ex­ams to take and more pa­tients who need their help than days are long. One day at a time, to­geth­er they can."

Cov­ered pa­tient care, fe­tal cir­cu­la­tion

Re­flect­ing on the pro­gramme and the chal­lenges they faced, Pea­cock said: "Rapid­ly ex­pand­ing car­dio­vas­cu­lar care and en­hanced pub­lic sec­tor ac­cess to that care, were ad­di­tion­al re­spon­si­bil­i­ties to every­one in the lab. The his­tor­i­cal and too com­mon ad­ver­si­ties of lim­it­ed re­sources, time, man­pow­er and man­age­ment con­tin­ued to cre­ate dai­ly chal­lenges. Twelve more months past and the team named "No­ble Nine" main­tained their po­lite, pro­fes­sion­al and pre­cise stan­dards of care, de­spite many chal­lenges and ob­sta­cles."

She added: "A wide range of top­ics were cov­ered from sta­tis­tics to pa­tient care, the ner­vous sys­tem to trou­ble shoot­ing com­plex equip­ment, phar­ma­col­o­gy to fe­tal cir­cu­la­tion." The in­ter­ven­tion was even more time­ly since sev­er­al re­searchers had ex­pressed a pre­vail­ing sen­ti­ment Trinidad record­ed a high in­ci­dence of car­diac dis­ease in the West­ern World. They not­ed the de­mand for car­dio­vas­cu­lar ser­vices was bur­geon­ing since T&T's four catheter­i­sa­tion lab­o­ra­to­ries, three of which are in the pri­vate sec­tor, can meet on­ly half of the de­mand for these cru­cial pro­ce­dures.

Ryan, Browne thank Hop­kins

Com­ment­ing on the pro­gramme's suc­cess, Fran­cis Ryan, Head Nurse at the Catheri­sa­tion Lab, said: "We have been part­ner­ing with Johns Hop­kins In­sti­tute in a pro­gramme which takes a mul­ti-dis­ci­pli­nary ap­proach to help­ing im­prove the lev­el of pa­tient health­care. They have been teach­ing us var­i­ous things to in re­la­tion to car­diac catheri­sa­tion to help im­prove the lev­el of pa­tient health­care. They have worked hard with the staff and the stu­dents."

Both Ryan and his col­league Cash­mere Browne paid ver­bal trib­utes to the Johns Hop­kins per­son­nel who pro­vid­ed struc­tured and for­malised train­ing in car­diac catheter­i­sa­tion and elec­tro­phys­i­ol­o­gy. Apart from Pea­cock, Gra­ham laud­ed the stu­dents. On a lighter note, they were sent elec­tron­ic words of en­cour­age­ment from lec­tur­ers. Every­one en­joyed a video fea­tur­ing fun­ny mo­ments and class­room sit­u­a­tions. Stu­dents were cap­tured in their scrubs. Gra­ham was spot­ted at scenic Mara­cas Beach. Lo­cal flo­ra, fau­na and ar­chi­tec­ture was high­light­ed.

Min­is­ter of Health Dr Fuad Khan com­ments

Com­ment­ing on the Johns Hop­kins pro­gramme, Health Min­is­ter Fuad Khan said it was "an ex­cel­lent pro­gramme" and it de­vel­oped our car­di­ol­o­gists. "The chron­ic non-com­mu­ni­ca­ble dis­eases is a prob­lem and Hop­kins will soon be com­ing un­der the Min­istry of Health to help with car­diac prob­lems. About 40 per cent of our di­a­bet­ics have car­diac prob­lems."

Grad­u­ates

Aaron Baldeosingh

Cash­mere Browne

Jal­lon Ham­let

Earl Haynes

Mar­cia Hug­gins-Alexan­der

Michelle John

Lorne John­son

Tra­cy Lewis

Hi­lary Mo­hammed

Mus­tack Mo­hammed

Jo­di Ram­lo­gan

Neer­aj Ram­lo­gan

Fran­cis Ryan

Shiv­ana Singh

Ter­ri-Anne Williams

Giselle Yard


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