DIY Endoscopy??

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Nice idea, especially for developing countries, but there are reasons why endoscopes cost $$$. One obvious difficulty is cleaning them - they are notiously difficult to clean and can't be sterilized as the heat destroys them. For diseases like CJD, you only have to have one patient to have inadvertently had an endoscopy and you have to discard $30,000 worth of equipment and warn all the other unwitting patients who have had a scope after him using the same device that they might have caught a lethal disease. Same goes for HIV, hepatitis etc.

WOrking in an Afirican hospital a few years ago I was horrified to find that blood-stained swabs used in operations and latex gloves were routinely washed, sterilised and reused after surgery. Whilst I admire the chap's enterprise, I'd be cautious about commending something that had the potential to cause more harm than good.
 
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