The objective of the survey was to evaluate the participants’ use of their new skills after following the training course in laboratory equipment maintenance organized by the Ecole Polytechnique Abomey Calavi (EPAC) with the support of the Mérieux Foundation as part of its RESAOLAB project, and to measure its contribution to national maintenance systems.

The results of this study were passed on to representatives of the departments in charge of laboratories for the RESAOLAB member states at technical workshops that took place in Lomé in June 2022. This information was shared with the objective of encouraging better use of the available skills to improve laboratory equipment maintenance systems, which is extremely important for the quality of diagnosis.

This training course was set up in 2016 at the EPAC, with the support of the West African Network of Biomedical Analysis Laboratories (RESAOLAB), to fulfill the requirements identified in the laboratories. The objective of this training course is to allow technicians working in biomedical analysis laboratories to master basic skills in the preliminary preventative and curative maintenance of basic laboratory equipment.

Since the introduction of the training course in 2016, the Mérieux Foundation has supported the organization of six training sessions, training more than 90 people from all over West Africa, including 58 from the countries in the network.

Read the survey results

As part of the third phase of the RESAOLAB project, the Mérieux Foundation wanted to assess this unique training course in this part of Africa by conducting a survey amongst those who had followed the course.