A person is more important than the system

On February 3, the chief pediatrician of the Ministry of Health Vladimir Polyakov spoke out against sending children with cancer to treat abroad.

The chief oncologist of the Ministry of Health Vladimir Polyakov believes that if the child was diagnosed with “incurable”, then there is nothing to bring him to treatment abroad. In the picture: Children's Oncology Department of the City Hospital No. 31 in St. Petersburg, January 2013

Treatment of cancer patients abroad - discrediting domestic medicine, said Polyakov. And he added: if doctors in Russia recognized the child “inconceivated” (incurable), then it is ...

What to say? I work with terminally sick children. Instead of commenting on Polyakov’s words, I better just tell you a story about the child who was lying in the hospice and went to be treated abroad.

The child's name is Denis. In March 2012, his mother called the hospice late in the evening and said: “My son is three years old. He has cancer - sarcoma of soft tissues. We were treated at the Research Institute of Neurosurgery. Burdenko and in the NPC medical care to children in Solntsev. Now we are in the hotel on the outskirts of Moscow. This morning we were examined in the hospital, and we were told that everything, Deniska is incredible, is impossible. We were sent home. Now we are in the hotel, Denis is suffocating, he has pain. Help!" We called a private ambulance to the hotel address. An hour later, Denis was in the hospice. He was immediately given morphine, connected oxygen. Denis came to life - sat down, began to play, we even brought him a children's tent in which you can hide from doctors and nurses. And he hid there from injections and played in cars.

Denis's mother said that she wanted to take her son to England so that he was cured there. And we dissuaded her. Because Denis was in serious condition, he could not withstand the flight. Because treatment abroad costs crazy money and will probably be in vain. Because when there are so few days left, it is better to spend them with each other, and not run around embassies and aircraft. Because, as Polyakov said, "if domestic medicine recognized the child inconceivated, then he is really incredible." We even invited an oncologist from the RONC to them. Blokhina, so that he decided whether Denis will move the flight. And he said: no. He said that Denis would most likely die for three days. And you don’t have to go anywhere.

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No one, including the chief pediatrician, knows who will live and who will not

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Denis's mother did not listen to anyone, in two days she made a visa and took her son to London. And there he was cured of cancer. There was a long and complex treatment - with operations, chemotherapy, irradiation. In the summer of 2013, English doctors wrote Denis home in remission. At the end of last year, I had to perform an operation to restore the vertebrae destroyed by the tumor, now Denis is restored after the operation. Oncology is still in remission.

No one, including the chief pediatrician, knows who will live and who will not. One such error of domestic medicine is enough as with Denis in order to forever lose the right to call someone “really incredible”. This is the doctor’s duty to consult with colleagues from other countries to seek the possibilities of treatment. This is the right of the family - to decide that it is time to stop. The duty of the Ministry of Health is to build a healthcare system. The right of charitable foundations and you and me is not to take care of the system, but about every specific person who needs help here and now. Because a person is always more important than the system.

Photo: Andrey Pronin/ITAR-TASS/Interpress