Resources

Oxygen therapy is an essential part of ending preventable deaths among children and adults globally. However, reliable access to oxygen, paired with pulse oximetry, remains inadequate across many health facilities in low- and middle-income countries. This series of use cases highlights country examples where tools from the Oxygen delivery toolkit: Resources to plan and scale medical oxygen helped advocates, implementers, and decision-makers to plan, manage, and communicate the value of scaling up oxygen delivery systems and access to oxygen and pulse oximetry.This resource is part of the Oxygen delivery toolkit: Resources to plan and scale medical oxygen. The materials provided within the toolkit can be used together or separately, as needed. The complete toolkit is available at www.path.org/oxygen-delivery-toolkit.

This factsheet outlines critical questions and answers related to using medical gas piping systems to deliver medical oxygen. It is intended for use by health facilities, other implementers, and health decision-makers to understand the requirements, benefits, and challenges of procuring, installing, and utilizing a medical gas piping system.

Maternal and child health (MCH) funding is among the most cost-effective and lifesaving investments the United States can make. Since 2012, US leadership and investments through USAID have helped save the lives of over 340,000 women and 9.3 million children, reducing the mortality rate for children under five by nearly a quarter in USAID’s 25 priority countries.

PATH, in collaboration with the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) Ministry of Health, conducted a biomedical equipment survey in health facilities in DRC from November 2023 through December 2023.This report analyzes data collected through facility assessments from 340 health facilities in 26 provinces across DRC to provide a snapshot of their medical oxygen ecosystem. The purpose of this work is to quantify existing oxygen delivery and production equipment, consumables for administering oxygen therapy, bed capacity, and facility infrastructure characteristics. The survey included a mix of public and private health facilities of multiple levels, including provincial (HPR), secondary (HGR), and tertiary hospitals (university).The results demonstrate that the availability of oxygen services and respiratory care equipment is highly variable in health facilities in DRC. Pulse oximeters were entirely absent in 34% of facilities. The limited quantity of small equipment and delivery devices, such as flowmeters and cannulas, also varies considerably in availability and constrains the accessibility of available oxygen supply to patients.

PATH, in collaboration with the Senegal Ministry of Health, conducted a biomedical equipment survey in health facilities from November 2023 to December 2023.This report analyzes and presents data collected during facility assessments of 114 health facilities in 14 provinces across Senegal, by service ward, to provide a snapshot of the country’s medical oxygen ecosystem.The purpose of this work is to quantify existing oxygen delivery and production equipment, consumables for administering oxygen therapy, and bed capacity, and to understand facility infrastructure characteristics. The survey included a mix of public and private health facilities at multiple levels—including health posts, two levels of health centers, and three levels of public health hospitals.The results demonstrated that the availability of oxygen services and respiratory care equipment is highly variable across health facilities in Senegal. For example, 26 percent of facilities lack any pulse oximeters. Of the facilities surveyed, 44 (42 percent) reported possessing an on-site pressure swing adsorption plant for continuous, reliable oxygen delivery to patients.Most facilities that provide services with high demand for oxygen (e.g., maternity, surgical, and intensive care units) also possess oxygen concentrators. By contrast, cylinder use was not widely reported with few facilities keeping large stocks of cylinders to provide reliable supply.The available quantity of small equipment and delivery devices such as flowmeters and cannulas also varies considerably, which can limit the accessibility of available oxygen supply to patients.