Sarenga is a remote rural area 4 – 5 hours drive from Kolkata (Calcutta) and 2 hours from the nearest city with modern facilities. Khristiya Seva Niketan (KSN), a mission hospital in Sarenga, West Bengal, India. The hospital serves a large rural population, of mainly tribal people. Chief Biomedical Scientist Ivor J Mitchelmore and his two colleagues, in early 2020, tired and establish a Microbiology service in the small laboratory at the hospital. They were generously supported by several companies such as MWE. This enabled them to make a tremendous start, but then the pandemic struck and they were unable to support the local staff when problems cropped up.

In January of this year Ivor managed to help local staff overcome a problem they had been having with contaminated media. By the time he left for the UK, the local staff were processing urine samples for culture and sensitivity and they have been able to successfully continue this service to date. In 2023 Ivor is hoping that they will also be able to introduce some wound microbiology.

MWE’s support in this process has been highly appreciated.

At MWE, we are always happy to support as we know, at the end of every swab being used there is a patient. To find out more about this story visit IBMS Journal.