Appropriate and appropriated technology: lessons learned from ultrasound in Tanzania

In "the North" ultrasound has become a standard procedure in reproductive health services. In Sub-Saharan Africa where diagnostic imaging technology is increasingly transferred to, ultrasound is still quite a new technology. Its promotion as "appropriate" technology by international donors, however, overlooks the fact that ultrasound such as any technology when transferred is not automatically doing what it is intended to do. Rather, ultrasound may be used very differently. Hence, what ultrasound will actually do remains an empirical matter. This article offers an insight into the multiple constructions of ultrasound that exist in one hospital in Northwest Tanzania as the technology is appropriated by nurse-midwives, doctors, students, local healers, and pregnant women. If these emerging situated ultrasounds are made explicit, the question of whether a technology is appropriate becomes more complex than the ubiquitous term suggests.