On the afternoon of July 8, Russia launched one of the most powerful missile strikes on the capital of Ukraine ever. In particular, the largest children’s hospital, Okhmatdyt, came under attack. This tragedy resulted in deaths and injuries. Such cruelty toward children is not new for Russia.
Our correspondent from Lithuania, Kestutis Vagneris, spoke with Pavlo Plavskyi, Head Division of Pediatric Neurosurgery Ohmatdyt National Specialized Children’s Hospital – M. D. – Ph. D. The video of this interview was also published on Komentaras TV. He spoke about the realities of the clinic during the war.
Kestutis Vagneris (K.V): In my hands, I have a fake human brain. In your work, I’m sure you often think about the secrets that lie not in a fake, but in a living organism.
Pavlo Plavskyi (P.P.): Ohmatdyt is the largest children’s National Specialized Hospital in Ukraine. Complex patients are brought to us from all over the country. We provide very specialized and unique care. At the moment we do about 500 surgeries a year.
K.V: I learned a couple of minutes ago that there was street fighting near Ohmatdyt at the beginning of the war.
P.P.: Yes, this was indeed the case from the very beginning of the full-scale invasion. Diversion and reconnaissance groups tried to break into Kyiv Enemy agents had settled in the capital before the war and when there was fighting, they coordinated the Russian attacks. In those days many wounded were brought to our hospital. They were mostly civilians. The building we are talking about now was not adapted to medical services at that time. Doctors with their own hands moved the necessary medical equipment, cleaned the floor and did other necessary work. The children were moved to the minus floor for safety. They lived like a bunker. With the help of various funds, these children were sent to other hospitals in the country, because Ohmatdyt changed its specialization at that time – it took all the children who needed to save their lives. All the doctors lived and worked in the hospital 24 hours a day. I lived here for 45 days. I am sad to remember that many patients with serious wounds did not reach us. We learned about this from reports from other medical facilities.
K.V: The horrible events of July 8, when there was an air attack on Ohmatdyt and the footage of the devastation was all over the world.
P.P.: There was a massive missile attack on Kyiv that day. One of the missiles hit one of the buildings of the Ohmatdyt. Dialysis was carried out there, there were very difficult patients with various poisonings and kidney dysfunctions. During the explosion, a doctor died there and a nurse, also a person passing by, was very seriously injured. Then died and a child who could not be helped because of the raid. Fortunately, the missile hit that building which did not have many children in it at the time. If it had hit a neighboring building about 20 meters away, the damage would have been more serious and there would have been many more injured and dead. In the first case, another building where operations were being conducted was destroyed, and in our building on the side of the explosion, window panes were shattered. About 100 employees were injured, either from the shrapnel that flew in or from the broken glass. Our power plant was destroyed that day and our priority was to rebuild it so that electricity could be supplied to the hospital around the clock, otherwise, there was a risk of disrupting the operation.
K.V: When I met you for the first time, you said that you slept only 3 hours, now you have added a few more hours. How do you manage to maintain such a pace and such a physical and psychological load?
P.P.: My work, i.e. specialization is very narrow and rare. Having a large flow of patients, time has to be divided not into hours, but into minutes. As I have already said, we took the most complicated cases from all over Ukraine, because we were stressed before the war. We probably got used to living with this stress. Now we have double stress. Because of rocket attacks, sometimes we have to go down to the bomb shelter at night. When I go to international scientific conferences, I tell my colleagues about all this. In their eyes, on the one hand, I see sympathy, and on the other hand, incomprehension. War is not a TV picture. But even in such conditions, we improve our work. I have been in neurosurgery for 20 years and I remember those times when the mortality rate among our patients was 10 or 20 percent, and now it is only 0.3 or 0.4. There are a lot of children’s lives saved under those numbers.
K.V: After the terrible events of July 8, the whole world responded and began to help Ohmatdyt, sending money to the open fund. But then we read that there was a scandal because of the transparency of the use of this humanitarian aid.
P.P.: Yes, this unfortunate situation has happened. At this point, I don’t know how it’s gonna play out. I do not have reliable information. I can only say that money was collected by many foundations, which are still actively helping us with medicines and consumables for the operation. Our hospital needs individual help, for example, certain medical equipment that was damaged during the missile attack. We are working with the foundations in this direction.
Kestutis Vagneris
