Identification of a device failure occurs when a device user has reported a problem with the device. As mentioned earlier, it may also occur when a technician in the clinical engineering department finds that a device is not performing as expected during IPM.

Troubleshooting is to be done when someone has encountered a problem with a device. It may be that the device doesn’t start or the device doesn’t perform the function that it is intended to perform. There may be different reasons for the device to malfunction and more often than not the shown symptoms of malfunction are common to many source errors.

For example, bad image quality from an ultrasound machine could be due to fluctuating power supply, problems with the preamplifier, problems with the probe, or changes in the calibration settings of the device. It is only with trial and error that you would be able to tell the reason for the error. You have to find the right reason for the encountered error and try to resolve it. The tricky part here is that you have to do it without wasting much time; your diagnosis of the problem must be on point and accurate otherwise you end up repairing the parts of the device that do not need the repair. For this, troubleshooting flowcharts help you to at least start with the troubleshooting process. Some of the charts are covered in the modules in this course. Experience is very important if you want to troubleshoot effectively and accurately.

Once you determine the root cause through troubleshooting, then you should have the right expertise to repair the device. Troubleshooting and repair together are called corrective maintenance.

This corrective maintenance may be accomplished at various levels:

• Component level
  • Component-level troubleshooting and repair isolate the failure to a single, replaceable component. In electrical devices, mechanical devices, and for discreet components of electronic devices (such as resistors or capacitors in an electronic circuit, or fuses) this is often the most effective repair approach. In relation to electronic devices, however, component-level repair may be time-consuming and difficult. Modern electronic circuit boards (digital circuit boards, especially) are frequently not repairable at the component level. In those cases, board-level or even system-level repair need to be considered

• Board level
  • For electronic devices, it is common to isolate failures to a particular circuit board and to replace the entire circuit board rather than a given electronic component.

• Device or system level
  • In some cases, even board-level troubleshooting and repair is too difficult or time-consuming. In such cases, it can be more cost-effective to replace the entire device or subsystem.