Sumy rehabilitation center gives disabled children a chance
It is as gratifying to have a child, as it is bitter to know that s/he suffers from a developmental handicap. Doctors claim that some pathology is manifested in 96% of all babies born today, especially in the nervous system. Why? The causes are many — from congenital dysfunctions to sociological evils, such as alcohol abuse and smoking.
Tanya Bohatyr from Sumy is one of these children who have been afflicted since birth. A birth injury left her right hand incapacitated, and no one could say what kind of future awaited the girl, since there was practically no chance of restoring normal motor functions. Now specialists at the Sumy- based rehabilitation center, where Tanya was admitted as a tiny tot, have done much to restore hope for her future. Doctors prescribed Tanya music classes so that her hand would be exercised as much as possible. Gradually, these classes, in combination with other techniques, bore fruit and ultimately helped her to carve out a career for herself. Under constant medical supervision, Tanya learned to play the domra (a Russian folk stringed instrument — Ed.), flute, mandolin, and piano. She is now a student at the Sumy Higher School of Arts and Culture. Musical therapy helped the girl restore the functions of her right hand to such an extent that she can now write with it (originally she had to learn to write with her left one).
What happened to Tanya is just one of the many “success stories” unfolding at the Sumy Regional Rehabilitation Center. The center came into being about ten years ago, thanks to the enthusiasm and devotion of its chief doctor Olena Shovkoplias, who at the time was a neurologist based at a local children’s hospital. It was she who banded together the parents of handicapped children and her colleagues, and in time the center was transformed into a separate unit in the city’s public health system.
Integrated medical-social and occupational therapy is aimed at helping children to nurture their personalities and, wherever possible, to realize their potential. The center begins to fight for a child’s future from the very first days of his or her life: the youngest patients are just one week old. The Department of Early Medical-Social Rehabilitation offers the required assistance, and the children’s mothers are actively involved: moms are taught rehabilitation techniques, such as massage and movement therapy.
In her capacity as chief doctor at the Sumy Regional Center of Medical- Social and Occupational Rehabilitation, which treats children with nervous system disorders, Dr. Shovkoplias has traveled abroad on a number of occasions. She is utterly convinced that Sumy specialists have achieved no worse results than their foreign colleagues. “Of course, I can’t say everything is bright and beautiful here — starting with the premises and ending with the straps to immobilize a baby in a special carriage. On the other hand, our treatment is not so expensive.”
Among the rehabilitation center’s former patients are Ukraine’s disabled champion athletes and gifted computer programmers. Every year the center treats approximately 1,500 patients. The Sumy specialists were the first in Ukraine to launch a service not available in other regions: a mobile medical rehabilitation team. According to team leader Nina Hrebeniuk, deputy chief doctor in charge of preventive treatment, this unit includes neurologists, psychiatrists, psychologists, social counselors, etc. Many of the oblast district centers already have mini-hospitals to treat children and teenagers suffering from nervous system disorders. The Sumy Regional Rehabilitation Center also trains specialists to treat children in rural communities: it supplies them with specialized literature and offers professional upgrading courses. Incidentally, none of the center’s employees resigned when their wages were not paid for several months because the center was being taken over by the state (it took quite some time to revise documents and solve juridical problems). Everyone continued to perform his or her duty in good faith, without sparing either time or effort. In all probability, this is exactly the way to do things at an institution that has set itself the goal of helping people to regain hope.
