51st DaY of AttAchMent

For the whole entire day, i did 2 repairs with Lee Chong which is the rigid laryngoscope and colour video printer from Sony, UP-2300P. I also did preventive maintenance of ISU as the staff nurse from day surgery found it so we left with single digit amount of devices.

Firstly, let's talk about rigid laryngoscope. It looks similar as opthalmoscope/otoscope. However, the slight difference is their purposes. When i say " laryngoscope", i believe most of you will able to guess the purpose of it since the name of it gives you a hint. laryn means throat (larynx). It has a light source which turns on due to a mechanism of lever pressing the stopper onto the light blub in a spring. The problem was the light is unable to light up for a while or do not work at all. We found that the contact between the lever and the stopper is not good so we just push the lamp and the stopper inner a bit and it works.

Secondly, staff nurse from Operation Theatre Level 2 called as the colour video printer is unable to print automatically and manually. Initially, we thought it is the wrong connection between the camera endoscopy and colour video printer. Our assumption was wrong so i got to go back and took the service manual. We took approximately an hour to analyze the problem and the cause of it. Someone mingled with the setting of the printer so we changed the back to the original setting and it works.

50tH DaY oF aTtAcHMent

It is the first time for me to ever see that the "awaiting repair" cabinet being empty as usually it is packed with equipments. However, on Faz and Lee Chong's tables, there is oxylog 2000 ventilator waiting for them to repair. It may seems like the more sophiscated the device gets, the more common problem may arised. For Lee Chong's case, the initial fault was "supply pressure low" displayed though full tank of oxygen was connected to it. After a few attempts to solve the problem, another problem arised which was " no ventilation" displayed. May be it still takes more time and patience to repair it properly.

The commission certs were piling and piling on Lee Chong's table. There were about 4 certs which 3 of them had to be done by today without telling us beforehand. It is the not the usual MMD type of work as they usually will sent the cert to us and we will just called to the vendor to schedule the commissioning. I just feel that may be the sisters need the devices urgently.

However, only 2 commissioning were done due to tight schedule. The 2 commissionings of eye-related devices were done by the same company which is Alcon. They are called OcuScan RxP and Accurus which has 2 individual parts ( surgical unit and brightness illuminator). Firstly, OcuScan RxP is a device used to measure the thickness of conrnea before doing lasering surgery. For Accurus, it can be used for doing anterior and posterior segments ophthalmic surgery such as cataract surgery. Anterior segments means only on the surface of the eyes such as sclera or lens whereas posterior segements meant by the region behind the lens. I just found out from the vendor that 3 holes have to be made on the eyes before any opthalimic surgery as one of them is for oxygen to be pumped into to maintain the pressure in the eye, the rest are for light source and cutter for the surgeron to operate on the eye respectively.

49Th DaY of AttaChMent

When i was about to settle down on my seat, i received a call from staff nurse Chiew that the anaesthesia unit, from datex-ohmeda, had oxygen leaking. Therefore, Faz and i went to Day Surgery to analyze the problem as it is impossible for it to be brought down. All the devices in the intensive care units and operation theatre are always have the first priority to be repaired. Staff Nurse Chiew showed us where the problem was. When oxygen is pumped to y tubing, the oxygen level seems to be dropping drastically. Therefore, Faz tightened all of the tubings and wiped all of the vapours on the lid for the bottle of soda lime. The problem seems solved. Anaesthesia unit is used to monitor the the oxygen level of the patient as every small drop of the oxygen level is very crucial. The bottle of lime soda is used to absorb the vapour produced by the patient to prevent it to enter into the unit. However, pure oxygen being introduced to a person will damage the brain. Therefore, once the unit detect there is a need of oxygen being pumped into the patient, it will mix nitrous oxide and carbon dioxide before pumpng the mixed air to him. Nitrous oxide is used to freeze some surgerical tools to cause burnig effect to remove cornea for example.

There was a commissioning of graseby omnifuse which is later version of pca pump compared to the pca pumps that i have been dealing with the last 2 months. Since it is a later version, the handset is more advanced in the sense that there is LED indication for bolus dose. The LED indicates the availability of bolus dose so after the patient pressed the handset, the LED will not light up until a period of time that the qualified nurse set. There are more settings that allowed user to set such a nausea and pain level, selection different brand of syringe and wider range of syringe being used. The plunger clamp is able to automatically clamp to the syringe by a button away.

48tH DaY of AtTachMent

Maintenance is about to finish and it is like faster than we expected to complete it. Therefore, we, faz and i, focus on repair more for today since lee chong is on full-day leave. For today, there were quite a few equipments sent for repair.

Morning.....
The bladderscan, BVI 3000, was sent for repair since last sat due to the internal printer's disability to process the results. Since i haven't deal with this device before, Mr Toh will show me the ropes in solving this problem. The first thing that came to his mind was paper jam. However, the remains of the torn paper were stuck inside the device so he has to start to remove the cover in order to remove the pieces. The only thing that i was shocked to see was you have to remove about 20 screws of different sizes in order to do a simple task. It seems so tetious compared to older version which you only have to remove 4 screws to get to the internal components. After solving the problem, have to wipe the roller with damped alcohol pad.

A nebuliser is sent down with a intermitten suction unit. Usually, i will just do some analysis on the devices to find the problem that cause it to become faulty. Firstly, after checked for 15 minutes, using the inhaler to test whether the nebuliser is able to pump air to the water ( we used it to test the production of mist). It seems like working fine so most probably it is the tubing is being occluded somewhere or lies with the end-user. Secondly, the infusion pump's vacuum probe seems unable to fit to the wall vacuum. Since the probe is kind of rusty, i changed a new probe for it.

In the afternoon, Mr Toh brought back a intermitten suction unit with cracking cover and lost of a nameplate after returning the bladder ultrasound scanner to ward 3. without hesitation, i started to replace the cover and give it a nameplate. My job is done for the suction unit. You have to repair and make sure it is running according to the specifications whenever they are sent for repair. Lastly, we spent the last hour solving problems with the oxylog 2000 and manikin. For the oxylog 2000, the minute volume always not within the specification from MOH but within the manufacturing specifications. After exchanging the patient valve and tubing that connect the patient valve from the ventilator, it seems like the problem lies with the tubing as we exchanged with another oxylog at the storeroom. Both of them are able to produce a minute volume within both specifications. Lastly, the head of the manikin came off so we latched back the head to the body.