Скачать или смотреть Floating clinic visits remote communities in Siberia

(19 May 2017) LEADIN
A mobile health clinic is setting sail in remote Russia to visit communities cut off by the freezing winter conditions.
The huge territories of Northern Siberia are almost inaccessible for up to 9 months each year, the roads are inadequate and there's no regular air connection.
STORYLINE
This boat called 'Rus' is a floating clinic heading off on a journey along the river Ob.
Eighteen medics say goodbye to friends and family, who they will not see again for around fifty days.
They are off to bring medical care to residents in isolated communities of northern Siberia, who have been cut off from the world by the long harsh winter.
The river is an artery and a lifeline. When the ice melts in May, friends and family gather on the dockside in Tomsk to wave goodbye to the travelling medics.
The 'floating clinic' travels along the Vasyugan swamp, the largest one in the northern hemisphere, traversing 4000 kilometres along waterways of the Ob and its tributaries.
The medical ship was started by Tatyana Solomatina, a doctor in the region who was born and raised in a swamp village. Solomatina is now a member of the Russian parliament.
"I know what situation is there, what transport accessibility is there, as a doctor and as a person. I really realize that's the only way we can provide (them) with specialist medical care because even if a man (from those areas) gets to here (Tomsk), here is no guarantee of someone (of medics) waiting for him," Solomatina says.
The project of Solomatina costs 11 million rubles ($200,000 US dollars) each year, which allows the ship to be equipped with a wide range of medicines, ultrasound and X-ray machines, and arrange labs for blood and other tests on board.
One of the main sponsors is gas company Gazprom, which gave 8 million rubles for the floating clinic. The local authorities also provide funding.
Oncologist Vladimir Krylov says "(We) try to be mostly autonomous. We bring ultrasound, our own lab. Last year they (colleagues) managed to bring even an X-ray machine."
The passengers include specialists of various medical disciplines including a physician, a paediatrician, a cardiologist, a gynaecologist, a neurologist, a gastroenterologist, a ophthalmologist, a endocrinologist, a oncologist, and even a surgeon.
They provide people in the northern localities of the Tomsk region with comprehensive diagnostic examination, and if a serious disease is detected, they send patients to the hospitals in bigger towns for treatment.
Doctor Yevegenia Enguel says: "They (people of the remote areas) mainly come only to us. Children (for check ups ) before (entering) kindergarten, kids (for check ups) before (entering) school, recruits (for check ups) before (entering) army. All they come to us because they have no possibility to go to the district center (where are hospitals). So there is a complicated situation there. Without the floating clinic I think the population would decline very significantly."
After the end of the Soviet era, many clinics closed and medics left. In order to get medical treatment, villagers had to travel by helicopter for a few hours or by boat for a few days.
Now the medical aid, in the form of the free floating clinic, comes to them, with no charges for the patients.
In Russia it is free to see a doctor but diagnostic checks such as blood tests, scans and medicines must be paid for by the patient.
The floating clinic provides everything including medicines for free.
Residents eagerly await the arrival of the medical ship because it's the only opportunity for a general check up once a year.

Find out more about AP Archive: http://www.aparchive.com/HowWeWork
Twitter:   / ap_archive  
Facebook:   / aparchives   ​​
Instagram:   / apnews  


You can license this story through AP Archive: http://www.aparchive.com/metadata/you...