In November 2018, Founder Mark, his wife and trustee Kate and Family set off an adventure of a lifetime. Leaving the comforts of the UK, they moved to Muheza in Tanzania. Mark and Kate worked in the hospital (Mark, a Surgeon, helping to develop the surgical services; Kate, a GP, supporting the work of the Hospice) and their girls (then aged 11, 9 and 5) embraced African school. There was blood, sweat and tears from all of them and whilst they faced plenty of challenges, it was one of the most rewarding periods of their lives.
Among the many things they did, Mark took with him the concept of using ‘mosquito net’ mesh for hernia repair. Modifying the principles that were so generously shared with him by Professor Andrew Kingsnorth of Hernia International, he set up a sustainable mesh hernia service training the two local AMO surgeons Drs Kibaja and Kibula in the clinical and technical aspects of hernia repair and the local CSSD lead Amos in the techniques for mesh preparation and sterilisation. This turned out to be a hugely successful endeavour and became the ‘proof of concept’ or ‘pilot study’ for our first project the TNMHP.
Setting this service up was no small feat and a blow by blow account of his time there can be found at Mark’s blog.
On the 27th November 2018 after weeks of hard work and problem solving the first mesh was used in a patient.
At the beginning of April 2019, the Family left Muheza to return to their lives in the UK. 50 mesh hernia repairs were completed (amongst a host of other things) and a fully functional, sustainable Mesh Hernia Service was established. See Centre details to find how they are getting on today.
In May 2019, Mark had an article published on the Royal College of Surgeons website; Musings of a Travelling Surgeon.
In June 2019, Mark returned to Tanzania to attend the Tanzania Surgical Association (TSA) AGM and Scientific Meeting. He was invited to present the hernia work from Muheza and put together a proposal that was embraced by the TSA and would become the Tanzania National Mesh Hernia Project and the catalyst for SWIFTSS to be set up.