Chief physician of Derbent hospital explains problems with medicines for cancer patients

The city of Derbent has seen a rapid increase of cancer patients, and, because of shortage of medicines, the Central City Hospital (CCH) has to send a number of patients for treatment to Makhachkala, Devletkhan Mirzakhanov, the hospital's chief physician, has stated.

The "Caucasian Knot" has reported that a shortage of medicines for cancer patients at the Derbent CCH was caused by a sharp increase in their number, as the CCH's administration had explained. Users of "VKontakte" and Instagram* called for an inspection of the CCH and criticized doctors for their failure to take prompt measures to avoid the drug deficit.

The number of cancer patients turning to the Derbent CCH has increased many-fold, Mr Mirzakhanov told the "Caucasian Knot" correspondent. "During the year, we had planned to take 2000 cancer patients, but only in the first half-year we treated 1504 ones. There are much more patients now," he said.

The chief physician has explained that the CCH is buying the necessary medicines, but many of them are not always available from suppliers in a timely manner. "Some 60-70% of drugs for cancer patients are imported from abroad. We have drugs for chemotherapy treatment regimens, but for some of them there are not enough drugs; and we are forced to send patients to Makhachkala, to the Republic's Oncology Dispensary," Devletkhan Mirzakhanov has summed up.

This article was originally published on the Russian page of 24/7 Internet agency ‘Caucasian Knot’ on July 21, 2022 at 08:39 pm MSK. To access the full text of the article, click here.