Medical front. How doctors from Eastern Ukraine save the lives of cancer patients

The sixth month of the full-scale invasion of the Russian invaders into Ukraine.

The Ukrainian people heroically defend themselves from the aggressor.

Russians kill civilians: disabled people, pensioners, women, children.

Medical infrastructure is in particular focus. The task of Russian terrorists is clear — to paralyze the provision of medical care to Ukrainians.

March 9, 2022, Mariupol. Russian fighters are bombing

children's hospital No. 3 and the city's maternity hospital.

There are many mothers and newborns in the maternity hospital. Dozens of victims.

A seriously injured pregnant woman is dieing. Her child is not saved either.

We performed a caesarean section. Got the baby without signs of life.

For more than half an hour, resuscitation of the child did not give results.

Then another half hour of resuscitation of the mother — without results. Both died.

Mykolaiv. RF bombed a psychiatric hospital.

April — shelling of the hospital in Bashtanka, Mykolaiv Oblast.

The same month — a hospital in Rubizhny, Luhansk region.

Donechchyna - a trauma hospital in Lyman. In the same April, the aggressor shot this medical institution from "Hurricanes".

End of April. Hospital in Severodonetsk. One of the two institutions that worked in Luhansk region at that time.

Russian terrorists shell the hospital with artillery. Three floors were damaged.

Dead and wounded. At the time of the shelling, more than 50 patients were in the hospital.

End of May - this hospital is shelled again.

The vehicle fleet was destroyed, the generators that supplied electricity to the operating rooms were broken.

July 14. Rocket attack on the center of Vinnytsia. 24 people died. More than 70 wounded.

During the shelling,  local Neuromed clinic doctors were treating patients.

This medical diagnostic facility was completely destroyed by the Russians.

Doctors Natalya Falshtynska, Tetyana Kharchenko and Kateryna Gula died.

At the time of the shelling, they were receiving patients.

This is an incomplete list of completely destroyed medical institutions in Ukraine.

Today we will talk about the selfless work of doctors from Donetsk region.

Thanks to the coordinated work of their team, managed to evacuate both personnel and expensive equipment to the West of Ukraine.

Oleksandr Geiko, the chief physician of the Kramatorsk Oncology Dispensary, supervised the process.

I am fifty years old, I graduated from Donetsk Medical University. Until 2014, I lived in Donetsk, worked in Donetsk.

The last place of work was the head of a private medical institution. It was such a multidisciplinary medical institution.

Until Donetsk was captured by the so-called "DNR", I lived and worked there. Then - as we thought - left for several months from Donetsk.

And it ended with the fact that until now we are on Ukrainian territory.

How our institution was established. In 2014, when Donetsk was occupied by the Russian Federation, and of course all the facilities provided

qualified medical care stayed in Donetsk.

And in the territory of the South and North of the region there were in fact no such institutions, who would provide highly qualified assistance.

In fact, it became a question of organization, in fact from scratch, it was necessary to organize a new department.

And restore the normal operation of the medical service.

I was offered the position of deputy chief physician, and my task was to restore work, the organization of these new directions.

At that time, there was a city oncology dispensary in the city of Kramatorsk. However, it was an institution of regional subordination.

On the basis of this institution, they began to restore and create departments, which did not exist at that time in the north of Donetsk region.

At the first we opened a children's surgery department, which did not exist.

Then we opened the department of cardiac surgery.

After some time, we opened the department of hemodialysis and artificial kidney.

Then some time passed, the oncology service already existed.

But the oncology service was under such a heavy load.

At first, it served only the city of Kramatorsk, and then, in fact, the entire North of the region.

And parts of the Luhansk and Kharkiv regions - all began to use the services of this institution.

The load of patients on this institution, has literally increased many times over.

Over a period of time, an exceptionally new such institution appeared in Kramatorsk.

Later, we reorganized it. Several such separate Medical Centers were made.

There was a Medical Center of Modern Oncology, which was exclusively engaged in providing oncological care, the Department of Cardiac Surgery was made the Medical Center of Cardiovascular Surgery.

The hemodialysis department was turned into the Artificial Kidney and Hemodialysis Center, and then a Diagnostic Center was added to us.

Later, the Kramatorsk city oncology dispensary underwent reorganization.

The Regional Territorial Medical Association was created, which included all these centers.

It was quite a large institution. We have more than a thousand vacancies, but in fact fewer people worked.

Fewer employees - because there was a shortage of specialists.

At the beginning of the twenty-second year, in my opinion, we were working very well. We had good indicators of activity. And we have achieved certain successes.

We performed more than two thousand operations annually, there were more than twenty thousand outpatient consultations only in the Center of Modern Oncology.

In general, if we take the packages that were concluded with NSZU, under the outpatient package, we provided more than 9,000 consultations every month. This is the whole institution.

That is, we counted everyone. Both the Cardiovascular Center and the Diagnostic Center.

Among such professional achievements, the cardiovascular center performed "open" heart operations.

Our specialists have already performed these operations on their own.

The oncology center performed almost the entire range of oncological interventions.

Also, in the oncology center, we built a room to accommodate a linear accelerator.

Our region purchased a linear accelerator, financed all this construction.

In April 2022, we planned to open the linear accelerator, it was already installed. There had already been some trial runs, and it had to start working.

It was a new model accelerator and it would be very useful. It would be such a huge event.

At the Center for Nephrology and Hemodialysis, we served about two hundred patients.

This is a large number and we planned to start a transplant program. Our doctors were on training in Lviv, we cooperated closely.

And we were preparing for the first transplant operations.

If everything was fine, we would have already performed operations in that April. We purchased the necessary equipment and everything else.

Our indicators, they were quite strong, let's say so. And everything was done. Everything worked. We had success.

And what happened was a complete surprise. We had a lot of plans, we had a very powerful movement planned.

We planned to build new buildings. A very large hospital was being built in our city.

That is, we had many plans for the future and we confidently moved forward. Then it was February 2022. And the beginning of hostilities.

What happened next? Then, as you know, the hostilities developed very quickly.

The first days, the first weeks, the first months — frankly: no one understood what was happening and how. And at first there was no clear plan how to move forward.

We watched the very rapid deployment of hostilities, we watched the entry of Russian troops into Mariupol.

We looked at the troops that were in the Kyiv region, and we looked at the rocket attacks that were almost all over Ukraine.

70 km from us is the so-called DPR, and we have lived all these years and knew that there is a line of hostilities.

That is, there was a tension that was constantly growing. There were several air raids in the city almost every day.

Of course, it was a great pressure on both the staff and the patients. The windows in our facility are covered with sandbags, boarded up, and so on.

Over a period of time, when hostilities began to advance in the Donetsk region, it really became a question of safety for both patients and staff.

March. Russian aggressors are mercilessly shelling residential areas of Kramatorsk.

Sleeping areas suffer.

April 8. Rocket attack on Kramatorsk railway station. It was from there that civilians were evacuated.

At the time of the shelling by the Russian aggressors, there were more than 4,000 civilians at the station. Sixty-one people died. More than 120 were injured.

If you remove any of these components, the institution will remain in place and will not move further.

We are doctors, we communicate with each other. Of course, we talked with our colleagues.

From Mariupol, from Volnovakha, and other places. And then all this information reached us. Both officially and unofficially. And we saw, we clearly knew that the equipment was being taken out.

Empty premises remain. Nothing remains. That is, as often happens, the doctor has his own equipment.

Each doctor has his own office. Maybe he have bought something there himself - for his own convenience. In the same Mariupol, I will not name specialists now, one hundred percent information — everything was taken away. They were left with empty rooms.

Later, according to what was said, this equipment was presented in Donetsk, exported to other cities of the DPR. That is, we saw what this leads to.

And there is medical equipment that can be loaded and taken out very carefully, of course.

And there is medical equipment that is difficult and complex. Which is mounted for weeks.

And taking it out is a very, very big problem.

And so when we made this decision, it was an extremely difficult decision.

Because transportation of medical equipment, dismantling, if in peacetime - this is done by the respective engineers. That is, only professionals do it.

But wartime imposed such restrictions. We had to do it, in fact, our doctors, our health workers and medical engineers, whom we were able to attract to us.

There were not many people willing to go to the Donetsk region and carry out dismantling.

We were taking a certain risk, but if total destruction was on one cup of the scales, complete dismantling and destruction. And on the second bowl - take it out, probably fix it later - but this equipment will be - we made this decision that we start dismantling and start removing the equipment.

At the time we started, there was still a railway connection to Kramatorsk.

And with the help of our leadership, with the help of the military-civilian administration, we were given railway carriages. And we are actually on our own,

with the help of doctors and mid-level medical workers, we carried out these works.

Collected this equipment. Of course, we packed it as carefully as possible, packed it, and we loaded into railway wagons. And in this way, we took out two wagons of medical equipment.

They were downloaded and we sent them. We had the task, first of all, to take them out of the region.

So that they do not stay in the region. Because the risk of capturing the region was very high.

Then the question arose - where to take them next?

At that time, a certain number of our specialists who left earlier who worked remotely, they were already in several regions of Ukraine.

And we were looking for a place to leave, literally knocking on every door. One of our employees was placed in the State Rehabilitation Center "Halychyna",

which is located in the city of Velikiy Lyubyn, Lviv region.

We talked with the director of this institution, we found an understanding there, found interaction. A very big thank you to this person - this is Hryhoriy Hryhorovych Dunas.

And we were allowed, at first we started transporting our equipment there. Our specialists remained in Kramatorsk, and we did everything to take out as much equipment as possible.

At some point, we realized that further stay in Kramatorsk, on the one hand, it was dangerous for both patients and staff.

The moment came when we organized the team as much as possible and left the city.

It was really a difficult decision, it was very difficult to leave the hospital. Yes, of course we left some of the staff there that stayed put, which looked after the hospital and everything else. But all this was difficult both morally and for other reasons as well.

What happened next? I will say right away that now. Now our hospital in Kramatorsk has resumed its work. But not all departments.

That is, the oncology center works in the hospital. Chemotherapy and outpatient care are provided. We do not provide planned surgical interventions. Because it is a real danger for both patients and staff.

When we came here to Lviv, we had such a main goal — not only to preserve medical equipment. The goal was to preserve our legal identity as well. That is, there were a lot of proposals for our specialists.

We have high-class specialists to go to work in various institutions. But the goal is to maintain a legal entity. Because we all expect to go back.

If now the team starts to diverge, each specialist will go in different directions, then the team as such will not remain.

And the goal now is to preserve this team. Whoose can be staied.

Basic specialists. Yes, if there is such an opportunity - so that we can come back.

And when we arrived in the Lviv region, literally a few days passed, we started looking for a place where we could immediately expand as a separate legal entity.

And it was a very difficult question. Because all the medical institutions that exist they worked with overload, a very large number of displaced persons.

And to provide space for us as a legal entity, unfortunately, we did not find it in communal institutions.

And let's also say: an institution like ours, if opened in a small town, where it will not be usefull for the sick. We will see only the destruction of the institution.

Now the system of self-payment is "Funds follow the patient".

That is, as many patients were treated, as much money was received. Theoretically, we can open in a small town or village.

But would there be a flow of patients? That is, if you follow this path, we can probably face the fact that the institution will not receive funding, which is necessary for its further work, and in fact will go bankrupt.

Therefore, we needed to open where our services will be in demand. And secondly, it had to be a place where we could encourage and somehow preserve the team.

We started searching. The search was long. Well, relatively long. But very intense.

Being in the Lviv region, we actually considered places for locations almost all over Ukraine. We looked very carefully at the Odesa region.

We were also looking for a place in the center of Ukraine. That is, these searches went in parallel. In fact, we accidentally got to know the management of the Rodyna network of private medical centers.

And in the process of negotiations, communication, we were offered to rent a certain part of the premises.

Therefore, we opened the very first location here in Lviv.

This was unusual for us, because such cooperation between a private and communal institution - it is such an unusual thing. First of all, yes: it was not very convenient.

That is, such a process of cooperation - everything did not work out immediately. But it was such an interesting experience, and it was 100 percent beneficial to us.

We were given a room. That is, we were given a room that is equipped with everything we need. We rented a completely ready-to-use operating room. We did not invest in the renovation of the premises.

We use both the equipment of a private medical institution and some of our own equipment.

And we were already able to open the first location and expand as an oncology service here. It is very convenient, very good location, as you can see. Of course, our doctors really liked her.

But our enterprise is quite large, and of course we continue our search. Now some time has passed, we were constantly moving, searching.

And at this time, we are concludeing a lease agreement with the Stryi district hospital. There will be a relatively small chemotherapy department.

As well as an outpatient appointment of our specialists, and an endoscopy room.

We are currently negotiating, and a lease agreement will be concluded in the Ivano-Frankivsk region.

Helping hand was extended to us, which was unexpected and very pleasant, such powerful help from the National Cancer Institute.

This is the leading medical institution of Ukraine, i.e., the very professional help of the oncology service.

We have concluded an agreement on strategic cooperation, we have communicated with the Institute's management.

So we will open a location in one of the cities of the Ivano-Frankivsk region. Our specialists will work there and we will cooperate with specialists

National Cancer Institute. In my opinion, this is a very promising stage of development. The fact that it will be usefull for the patients is one hundred percent.

We will be able to use both the power of our medical equipment and the potential of our specialists. And, of course, we can enhance all of this with leading experts from the National Cancer Institute.

In Lviv, we currently have a fairly large number of patients being treated in the chemotherapy department. The Lviv Regional Oncology Dispensary has a huge number of patients.

Considering the displaced people, our colleagues do not refuse anyone. A very large number of patients are coming. And of course, when we started working, we talked to our colleagues.

Part of the patients, of course, are displaced people, they refer them to our institution. We exported not only medical equipment, but also medicines from Kramatorsk.

That is, according to the Medical Guarantee Program, drugs for the provision of chemotherapeutic care, the patient receives from the state. Free. Now we have such a stock of medicines.

We use it, that's why patients come to us. And first of all, these are displaced people. Of course, these are patients who have been treated by us before. And -  who are somehow looking for their doctor.

There is also a certain number of local patients, it is small. We will see further. Our goal is to work so that the patient remains satisfied.

I believe that we will provide medical care without distinction: whether a displaced people, or a resident of Lviv, or Frankivsk, or another region.

The patient must receive the best care. And then the question is where he will be treated.

Tetyana Ivanivna Davydich was born in the city of Mariupol on February 5, 1954.

She worked in a library, a music school. I haven't worked for a year. When the war started, we were liveing in our private house.

We did not hide in the bomb shelter, because it is far from us. When the bomb arrived on March 17, it was a direct hit to the neighboring yard.

There is complete destruction, seven people died. Our neighbors. And our roof was damaged by the strong blast wave, the double-glazed windows were broken.

Destroyed everything. You can see in the photos. That is, it became impossible to live there.

We have a one-year-old child. And we got the shelter in "Skorbot".

We spent two nights there. On the third night, this area was also bombarded. My son and I ate outside. Although it was frosty, the sun was shining during the day.

And my husband desided to go home. But he was not haveing time to eat - then a bomb flew upstairs. It was somehow behind the house - and you couldn't even hear it at first. To be honest, I haven't even heard.

Something hit me on the head – maybe a piece of tile. My husband -"I am not seeing anything." All was in blood. He came out covered in blood, he lost a lot of blood. All clothes, pants.

No matter how much hydrogen peroxide we poured, the bleeding was not stoping. The neighbor took us to the hospital on his Zhiguli. Husband's wound was stitched up there.

We walked back. These "kadyrovts" have came already in the hospital. We were seeing how these tanks drove. It was very scary.

It seemed that we were going - and they would shoot us in the back. We stopped and turned around - so that they can see that the huasband was wounded.

And these people with whom we lived in "Skorbot" - they moved to the music school's basement.

They prepared a place to sleep there. But we have a child — and there is a cement floor, darkness.

And the son said - "No, we are going. How much gasoline will be enough." The daughter-in-law stayed with my son and child in "Skorbot", and my husband and I ran.

But at this time a rocket is arriveing. I looked around the corner, and it was right on the road. But it did not explode. I had to clean the yard. Our yard is long.

Glass, boards, roof tiles. And when we came in, we were looking: near our flower bed with roses our neighbor was lieing dead.

I tell my husband - "Run after these men, I will not lift the corpse - it is heavy." So they moved it, put it on the path. And then they moved him to an apartment.

They helped us open the gate. Because they were skewed. We have a garage, just in the house. By the time we packed up, three o'clock must have passed.

My son drived on the road, and all this time they were bombarded and shot at - it's a kind of horror.

You know, nothing scared me anymore. Bombs flew somewhere nearby, and I'm cleaning because I have to.

The son shouts - "Mother, come here." It was really scary for us there. I already jumped into the closet - it seemed that here - here is the cover.

In short, we managed to leave - there was a five-minute lull. Or ten minutes. Thanks to this, we left. When we passed by, we have the old part of the city there.

UTOS, Panchishna factory — the road had not damaged yet. Then they bombed there too. We went to Slobidka, and people were walking there - as if there is no war.

We left the city, there we have such a village of sailors. We left the city - to Melekine.

And there was the first roadblock. The son was forced to undress to the waist, and his tattoos were checked.

They checked whether there were any traces of a bulletproof vest. How did we manage? We passed about fourteen or fifteen checkpoints.

Well, we opened the trunk. Documents were checked. They looked into the car. And the husband was sitting wounded, he had such a hematoma. A small child is next to him. One-year old. I sat tired.

And I also thought why they didn't check us carefully - we don't have a foreign car, we have an old Zhiguli. Ninety or ninety-first year. That's why they think - what to take from them. We didn't have anything to take away.

And the last one before Zaporozhye was a roadblock, where phones were also checked. I ran away from these bombings, and here you see what happened to me.

They fired at the bus in front of us. With people. And all cars were forced to detour. And in this village, it has been already destroyed, the Ukrainian army has been already there.

They ordered us not to get out of the car. Meanwhile, "Grad" arrived. If they were a little further, they would surely have hit our cars.

It seems that we have already traveled such a path, and to cover with Grad here. And in front was the car - we were all sitting in the dark, we cann't see who was there.

The girl screamed - she was very scared. Apparently, she also leaved from under the bombings. Children are different - we have a one-year-old child, and it was scared.

When the bombing started, especially when the plane flew by, our house was shaking so much.

My husband and I sat, bent like this, praying - it was very scary. From that time, my heart started to ill a lot. We lay - my heart hurt so much.

And there wasn't even a validol. We have nothing - everything was robbed. Both pharmacies and shops. I had an operation in the fourteenth year - the gall bladder was removed.

And my side hurt. Well, it hurt and it hurt. I didn't pay attention. They arrived here - I didn't have any pain - except for pressure.

There was a lot of pressure. In Dnipropetrovsk, I was measured, it was 220 by 120.

We arrived in Truskavets in April, the second of April. Like nothing, everything was fine. And at the beginning of May, I started having pains.

Such pain, I suffered for two weeks. I thought maybe the spine or kidneys. I could not understand anything. Then the husband insisted on seeing a doctor.

We went to a gastroenterologist, passed tests. And the ultrasound showed that it was a "cyst". Then I went to the family doctor.

And I say so and so, it hurts. She called a gastroenterologist. And she says, I will put you in a ward in the hospital. I lay there for a week.

An ultrasound was also done. And the doctor somehow doubted that it was a "cyst". They sent me to Lviv for computed tomography. The prices here - I was horrified: 2400 hryvnias. And she refers me to an oncologist.

We went to Drohobych. From there I was sent to Lviv.

I came here from Lviv, to the Kramatorsk branch. I had a biopsy done here.

Well, after a week, the result came, they said that I have a tumor.

And that is why they said that it is necessary to buy a "port system". It is sewn under the skin.

Because yes, it's a problem for me and for them.

But this pump costs from six to fourteen thousand. This is a lot of money for me.

Therefore, if someone can help, I will not refuse help. Thank you very much.

This material has been prepared and funded - The European School of Oncology (Milan, Italy) - https://www.eso.net/