From Deseret News archives:
West Jordan medical team visits Russia
Purpose of exchange is to find ways to help, learn from each other
But when it comes to medicine, there are both similarities and striking differences. Two Jordan Valley Hospital physicians and an emergency room nurse learned that during a recent "sister city health care exchange" to Votkinsk, which is 900 miles southeast of Moscow. And both communities could benefit from closer ties between the two, they say.
The trio Dr. Barbara Dahl, an emergency room physician, Dr. Arlen K. Jarrett, an obstetrician and gynecologist, and nurse Lisa Price were among a contingent that also included a physician from Tooele (and a tour of facilities in Tooele's sister city Kambarka), among others. They didn't go to provide care or show Votkinsk how to practice medicine, but rather to learn how they manage with fewer resources and what each city's medical teams can offer the other.
As many as 95 percent of the doctors are women. It is the doctors who provide most of the care, partly because equipment is so scarce. Price was startled to see how underutilized the nursing staff is. They don't do a lot of patient monitoring.
In Votkinsk, everyone receives care because medicine is socialized. But it is stretched thin and there are limits to how much care one receives, part of it dependent on where you live. In the region, for instance, there is one cath lab. There would be two, but a motherboard blew out a couple of years ago and hasn't been replaced. A dozen ambulances share a single glucometer. There are only two or three oxygen saturation measurers in the area. Such limitations affect both longevity and quality of life, Jarrett says.
Not all of the differences favor patients in America, says Jarrett. At a time when the on-site school nurse is a rarity in Utah, each school in Votkinsk has a pediatrician responsible for the students' health.
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