Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: THURSDAY, April 14, 1994 TAG: 9404140280
SECTION: NEIGHBORS PAGE: S-16 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: By KAREN L. DAVIS SPECIAL TO THE ROANOKE TIMES & WORLD-NEWS
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
"You are more up-to-date as far as technology. Your conditions are more comfortable for the patients, doctors and nurses. Your hospital is very clean. The staff is calm," said Dr. Sergei Belyavsky, a pediatrician from Pskov, Russia, on his first impression of American medicine.
"The nurses are very skilled. We have the same pathology. Treatment is comparable. Knowledge is the same. But you have more opportunity for [more accurate] diagnosis here, because of the technology," said Belyavsky, one of two doctors participating in the exchange.
"The main difference is money," said Dr. Tatyana Pavlova, director of pediatrics at Pskov Children's Hospital. "We're restricted now in our opportunities."
Since the breakup of the Soviet Union, the Russian economy lacks money for even basic hospital supplies, they said.
Dr. Hugh Wells, a neonatologist at Community Hospital of Roanoke Valley, visited Pskov Children's Hospital last year during an exchange visit to\ Pskov.
"I gained an appreciation for what we have here," Wells said. "We have better equipment, better technology. We work in luxury compared to the conditions there. Medically, Russian physicians have similar training and knowledge. Their treatment methods are similar. They are dedicated to their patients. But the conditions they work under are more difficult" because of severe shortages.
In Russia, Wells spent two weeks working with Belyavsky and visiting Pskov's medical facilities, which include the 265-bed children's hospital, an adult city hospital, a maternity facility and a regional hospital for patients from the area around Pskov.
Upon his return home, Wells and others at Community Hospital set about raising funds to bring Belyavsky and one other Pskov physician to Roanoke.
Jean Stephens, a nurse practitioner in the neonatal intensive care unit at Community Hospital, coordinated the effort to bring a Russian nurse with them. She made and sold salad dressing, raffled food and tickets and asked for contributions to cover the visitors' air fare.
Belyavsky finally arrived in Roanoke March 10 for a two-week stay. Traveling with him were Pavlova and Valentina Korolyova, chief pediatrics nurse.
The most serious deficit confronting doctors and nurses in the former Soviet Union is the lack of medications and medical supplies, said Natasha Petersen, chairwoman of the Sister Cities Roanoke-Pskov committee.
Items such as catheters, gloves and disposable hypodermic needles are always in short supply.
A group will depart from Roanoke in May to hand-deliver medicines and supplies to the Pskov hospital. "Our main thrust is to provide the hospital with medications," Petersen said. "But if we just send a package over there, it will disappear."
During their stay, the Russian visitors were treated to a concert of Russian music performed by the Kandinsky Trio. The concert raised $2,500 to buy antibiotics for the Pskov hospital, Petersen said.
Pskov, which borders Estonia about 200 miles southwest of St. Petersburg, has been a Roanoke sister city for 2 1/2 years. Roanoke's other sister cities are Kisumu, Kenya, and Wonju, Korea.
The selection of Pskov as a sister city came about "because several of us had visited the Soviet Union and decided it was time to adopt a sister city there," Petersen said. "We were trying to pick an older, smaller city in the Russian republic, instead of one in any of the other republics."
Belyavsky said he and his companions gained valuable insights from observing how hospital administration is organized and carried out here.
"We're building a new children's hospital, and it's important to us to organize it correctly," he said. In his country, he said, money for big projects, such as buildings, comes from the federal government rather than from the city. But money for new equipment is a different matter. The building may be finished in 1996, but the equipment will have to come later, he said.
When they return home, Belyavsky said, he and his companions will work to obtain new equipment, upgrade nursing education and reorganize their laboratories, based on their observations here.
Anyone wishing to contribute to the fund to buy medicines and supplies for Pskov Hospital should mail donations to Roanoke Sister Cities, Roanoke- P.O. Box 136, Roanoke, Va. 24002.
by CNB