Assessment of Medical Equipment Maintenance Practices at Secondary Health Facilities in Rivers State

Medical equipment downtime in Nigerian secondary health facilities significantly compromises clinical service delivery, and understanding the maintenance culture and practices at these facilities is a prerequisite for designing effective biomedical engineering support systems. This study assesses medical equipment maintenance practices at ten secondary health facilities in Rivers State, covering facilities in Port Harcourt, Obio-Akpor, and Bonny LGAs. A structured observational checklist and semi-structured interviews with biomedical technologists, equipment officers, and facility managers were used to collect data across fifty equipment categories including imaging devices, laboratory analysers, surgical equipment, and patient monitoring systems. Equipment availability was assessed by operational status audit. Findings show that preventive maintenance schedules were documented at only three of the ten facilities, while corrective maintenance was the dominant practice across all sites. Equipment downtime exceeded thirty percent of total operational time across the facility sample, with imaging equipment showing the highest downtime rates. Sixty-two percent of equipment faults were attributed to lack of routine servicing, while inadequate spare parts availability accounted for twenty-four percent of extended downtime periods. Only two facilities employed a dedicated biomedical technologist, with the remaining eight relying on clinical staff for basic troubleshooting. Maintenance expenditure records were absent or incomplete at seven facilities. The study recommends the establishment of a state-managed medical equipment maintenance programme, the deployment of trained biomedical technologists at all secondary facilities, and the adoption of computerized maintenance management systems to track equipment status and service schedules in Rivers State. Keywords: medical equipment maintenance, secondary health facilities, equipment downtime, Rivers State, biomedical engineering.