I travelled to Belarus with Stuart Bootle, a doctor from Derbyshire who specialises in promoting better Diabetes care in the UK. He had an extremely busy and useful visit during which he:

Met Elena Vanilovich, an endocrinologist in Minsk, and visited a polyclinic and hospital with her

Spent a day and a half with the Diabetic Association in Gomel, visiting another polyclinic and six families with diabetic kids, many of whom had developed complications due to insufficient monitoring

Spent a morning at the Republican Hospital in Gomel with George Romanov, the Chief Endocrinologist

Children in Belarus are given just one strip a day to test their blood sugar, whilst in Britain they would use three or four. At 18, this supply is stopped and a young person who is very short of money would be able to test very infrequently. It is also advisable to have a test every four or six months called an Hba1C which shows your blood sugar level over a period of several weeks. Only with this test can proper adjustments to insulin levels and/or diet be made. Very few children in Belarus get this test, and this will be one of the reasons why so many teenagers and young adults are going blind, suffering kidney failure or becoming physically disabled.

As a result of this visit Stuart is planning to try to set up an international study which would include regular Hba1C testing of a large group of children and young people in Gomel and Minsk. He is hoping to do this through Liverpool University with children in Liverpool also being involved in the study, and hoping to involve Roche and Nova Nordisk in supporting the project.

Stuart also plans to appeal to doctors and others in the medical profession to pledge personal support for diabetic patients in Belarus.

During Stuart’s four day visit we also went to the Home for Abandoned Babies which has two blocks, one for babies and disabled children and one for children of 18 months to four years old. After the Director and Tatiana, the Chief Care, visited Britain a couple of years ago, they moved the Downs children into the block for the ‘normal’ kids, and they have now been joined by other children with disabilities and genetic disorders and there is much more integration. Sasha, who has parts of all his limbs missing has now moved to the second block. Adam has no arms at all and only very small legs. He is a delightful and obviously very intelligent little boy but it is hard to imagine what his future will be. No prosthetic arms are possible for him so he will always need total care.

TOP | NEXT SECTION