Health facilities ability to diagnose tuberculosis across fifty municipalities in Regions VI, VII, and VIII will be enhanced thanks to the delivery of high-powered biological microscopes from the World Health Organization, funded by the Government of Japan.
The microscopes were requested by the Department of Health’s Disease Control Bureau for use by microscopy centers in the Visayas which lost their capability to perform sputum examination after their equipment was destroyed or damaged by natural calamities including the earthquake in Bohol in October and Typhoon Yolanda in November of last year.
Sputum microscopy is a vital component of the National Tuberculosis Control Program. The procedure enables laboratory personnel to examine properly prepared and stained slides of sputum samples taken from TB suspects, and identify tuberculosis bacillus with the use of a high-powered microscope.
These microscopy tests provide health workers with a great deal more diagnostic data than x-rays, enabling them to promptly enrol confirmed tuberculosis cases in the Directly Observed Therapy Short course (DOTS) programs, thereby resulting in much better treatment outcomes.
Funded by a grant from the Government of Japan, the fifty Olympus CX22 microscopes are equipped with built-in LED illumination, adjustable binocular eyepieces, and 100X oil-immersion objectives to allow ultra-high magnification. There is an anti-fungus coating for the tube and optics making them suitable for Philippine field conditions, especially in the Western, Central, and Eastern Visayas provinces.
The microscopes were formally handed over to the Department of Health by WHO Representative in the Philippines Dr Julie Hall on Friday, 9 May 2014. Receiving the microscopes on behalf of the Department of Health’s TB program was Dr Mario S. Baquilod, Director of the Infectious Disease Office, National Center for Disease Prevention and Control.
WHO Representative in the Philippines Dr Julie Hall, and WHO Medical Officer for TB Dr Woo-Jin Lew formally hand over one of the fifty high powered biological microscopes to the Department of Health’s Director of the Infectious Disease Office Dr Mario S. Baquilod. The microscopes, which were donated by the people of Japan, would enable laboratories in calamity afflicted areas to conduct sputum examinations to help in the diagnosis of Tuberculosis.