Beirut, January 09 2023: The United States Agency for International Development (USAID) through the American Schools and Hospitals Abroad (ASHA) has generously supported the LAU Health Foundation, and the LAU Medical Center Rizk Hospital, with three grants worth 3.57 million dollars.
These grants, made possible through the generous contributions of the American people, are provided with the patients in mind and with the ultimate aim of improving patient safety in line with American standards and practices, while improving the hospital’s staff efficiency, surgical outcomes, and cost effectiveness.
The lynchpin of the LAU Health Foundation is to Heal with Compassion, hence the importance of continually developing and improving patients experience within the LAU Medical Centers.
The first two grants, which recently expired, were allocated to develop and implement the ultramodern Hybrid OR at the LAU Medical Center- Rizk Hospital and to enhance OR efficiency. With the state-of-the-art commodities and equipment supported by highly trained personnel, the hospital acquired a hybrid operating room enabling its surgical team to perform more complex procedures with better outcomes and shorter patient recovery.
These two grants also allowed the implementation of best practices upheld by the American College of Surgeons that contributed to operating room safety, efficiency and usage of operating room equipment. Through USAID’s support, LAUMC- RH doubled its capacity to sterilize surgical utensils and reduced sterilization time by half, which enables the hospital to manage sustainably more surgeries.
The third ongoing grant is dedicated to setting up an efficient pharmacy system. While hospital Pharmacists are responsible for overall dispensing of medications, better controls through a state of the art closed loop medication system helps improve efficiency, quality of care and minimize dispensing errors. With ASHA’s support, more effective and timeline controls will provide the right patients with the right dose of the right medication at the right time through a high level of traceability across the hospital.
Dr. Mawad declared: “The American generosity is invaluable during these difficult times. It is a true source of support to the Lebanese through enduring hardship. These grants help our medical center uphold American medical practices institutionally, and more importantly enable the next generation of health sciences students, including in medicine, pharmacy and nursing, embrace these practices in their training and professional development, which will reflect positively on patient care in any place these students serve in the future.”
Sami Rizk, “The enhancement in patient safety and the improvement in the processes of surgery and medication dispensing is our duty and our ambition in terms of medical support to the community is immeasurable.
This is why those grants are so important; they will allow the hospital to develop further its capacity building and embracing American best practices that contribute to improved medical services at large, and better alignment with JCI accreditation requirements.”
USAID’s American Schools and Hospitals Abroad (USAID/ASHA) initiative provides assistance to overseas schools, libraries, hospital centers, and centers of excellence to highlight American ideas and practices, to provide concrete illustrations of the generosity of the American people, to further U.S. Government public diplomacy, and to catalyze collaboration between U.S. citizens and citizens of other countries.
The American Schools and Hospitals Abroad initiative began in 1947 and was incorporated into USAID by the Foreign Assistance Act of 1961. Since its inception, ASHA has achieved a visible legacy by providing assistance to approximately 300 institutions globally and aiding in the development of medical centers and innovative and state-of-the-art schools, libraries, in more than 80 countries.
ASHA currently manages a worldwide portfolio of approximately 120 awards and is an invaluable complement to USAID’s wide-ranging development work.