CHARLESTON, S.C. (WCBD) – The Medical University of South Carolina (MUSC) is providing much-needed medical equipment to a severely understaffed and undersupplied hospital in one of Africa’s poorest countries.

Mercy Hospital is a 50-bed facility in Bo, Sierra Leone. The hospital has two operating rooms and one doctor, yet serves around 10,000 patients per year.

MUSC said that the doctor and his staff often use their cell phones for light during operations and boil their instruments to sterilize them.

The hospital does not have access to lifesaving devices such as defibrillators or ECG machines.

On Wednesday morning, MUSC loaded a 40-foot shipping container with operating room lights, an autoclave and Bovie surgical instrument, a water purifier, stretchers, patient monitors, automated external defibrillators, surgical instruments, wheelchairs, over-bed tables, sterile processing carts, bedside commodes, hospital bassinets and approximately 10 pallets of various personal protective equipment.

Roper St. Francis Healthcare is expected to donate ECG machines as well.

The donation is being facilitated by nonprofit Helping Children Worldwide, which “collaborates with international program partners to tackle poverty and transform community health.”