Kostiantynivka and Lyman
MSF has supported the emergency department, and surgical and intensive care units with medical care at the Kostiantynivka Hospital since late July. The MSF teams work alongside and in partnership with Ukrainian Ministry of Health staff. Most of the cases they see are trauma cases.
Lyman is in an area recently retaken by the Ukrainian forces. MSF teams have visited the area, donated medical supplies and mobile clinic consultations in the past few weeks. They will continue to intervene in this area and to further explore how MSF can best respond to needs.
Donetsk oblast
Support for hospitals
We are focusing on supporting the emergency room in Sloviansk hospital. Once the department opens, Sloviansk hospital will be the only hospital to provide this service in the oblast, including those of newly retaken areas. Primary health care and network set up are being connected to other organizations able to provide medications. We provide support to primary and secondary health care facilities in human resources, supply provision, monitoring SRH, mental health, emergency care, medical and surgical needs, pediatrics, maternity, and neonatology.
We also send donations to primary, secondary, and tertiary health care places. And we provide training support on specialized emergency response like MCP training, MHGap, and peritonial dialysis.
Support for people left behind
After months of disruption or decreased activities, the health care delivery system is slowly trying to recover while the needs are increasing with the partial return of a population that cannot afford to remain displaced, like in the case of Sloviansk.
We are working with volunteers and civil society to identify gaps and support needs to be able to provide warmth and contingency planning this winter.
Care for Carers Program
As the conflict has put pressure on the local health care professionals, the teams are providing mental health support to medical and mental health care professionals, who experience burn out and stress. The activities include psychological group support and stress management trainings, focusing on providing coping mechanisms. The teams have also provided training in some other locations such as Odesa.
Uzhhorod and Ivano-Frankivsk
We have carried out training sessions on decontamination, mass casualty, sexual and gender-based violence, and mental health with local health professionals, psychologists, and first responders. Between March and August, we provided 36 training sessions attended by 707 people in the oblast of Zakarpattia, to which Uzhhorod belongs, and 62 sessions in Ivano-Frankivsk oblast, with the participation of 1,069 people. We continue to donate medical supplies to more than 10 health facilities in these two locations and distributing relief items (including bedding kits, hygiene kits, and food) for displaced people, particularly in nearby rural areas, as well as doing rehabilitation works at shelters. Throughout the past 5 months, our mental health teams in both locations have seen 330 patients in individual sessions and 4,557 patients in 488 group psychoeducation sessions.
In Ivano-Frankivsk we are supporting a fixed outpatient department point and a mobile clinic focusing on IDP patients run by doctors who are themselves displaced by the war. In 25 weeks of collaboration until the end of November, 2,541 medical consultations were done. In Uzhhorod and other peripheral areas we are running mobile clinics at IDP public shelters. Between July and November, MSF carried out 3,643 medical consultations through mobile clinics visiting 12 locations in Zakarpattia Oblast. The main medical conditions were chronic diseases and respiratory infections.