With the aim of improving the conditions and facilities of public health centers, the Health Sciences Department of the University of Nairobi (UoN) is in contract with the Health Department of Kiambu and Kerinyaga Counties. The University of Nairobi functions to set up projects that seek to upgrade the standards of the health centers and hospitals, and thereafter seeks for donors to fund the project.

In this project named CRISSP, the main objective was to set up Comprehensive Care Centres (CCC) – an extra department in eight hospitals they are in contract with – at the Kiambu and Kerinyaga hubs. The CCCs serve to cater for the needs of the HIV-infected persons in the two Counties. Among other obligations in the project was to ensure seamless and paperless operation and security of the setup premises. With this in mind, there was a need to install computer networks, CCTV cameras, queueing systems, procure computers and UPS. With all these in place, there was still more predicament affecting the operations, especially during a power outage.

To do away with the constant power blackouts so as to achieve seamless operation throughout the day, UoN came up with the idea of installing Power Backup Systems (PBS) for the seven sub-Counties and one referral hospitals. These PBS were to serve the centers for at least 8 hours in case of power outage.

The project was to be funded by the Centre for Disease Control (CDC) - USA.

Owing to the great reputation that Sollatek has, UoN reached out to us and a few of our competitors for an EOI on the project to install the PBSs. A site evaluation for the sites was arranged where on the first day we covered the following hospitals in Kerinyanga County:

1. Sagana Subcounty Hospital
2. Kerugoya County Referral Hospital
3. Kianyaga Sub-County Hospital and
4. Kimbimbi Sub-county Hospital

Kiambu County was covered the following day and the below hospitals were surveyed:

1. Kigumo Sub-County Hospital
2. Ngewa Sub-County Hospital
3. Karuri Sub-County Hospital
4. Wangige Sub-County Hospital

Due to differences in set up of the installations sites and the need to have the server and the CCC running throughout, in some of the hospitals the need to install two parallel PBS in one hospital was inevitable; i.e. one PBS in the CCC and another one in the server room. This configuration was done at: Kigumo, Ngewa, Karuri and Kimbimbi. This made a total of 12 PBSs for the whole project.

There was information that the power supply in Wangige was intermittent and sometimes took two days to resume. For this reason, a solar system was recommended for the site.

On completion of the site surveys, project financial proposals were forwarded to UoN for evaluation. After several meetings to discuss the proposal, Sollatek was awarded due to the proper approach to the solution and outstanding quality of the products.

On receipt of the LPOs and payment for Kerinyaga County, we embarked on installations in the following order:

1. Sagana Sub-County Hospital:

2. Kirinyaga Sub-County Hospital:

3. Kimbimbi Sub-County Hospital:

4. Kerugoya Referral Hospital:

5. Kigumo Sub-County:

6. Ngewa Sub-County Hospital:

7. Karuri Sub-County Hospital:

8. Wangige Sub-county Hospital:

For more information, please visit: www.sollatek.co.ke.