Dasha Starova, who turned to Vladimir Putin, died of cancer. Daria Starikova fight for life. Breaking news What happened to Daria Starika
A resident of the Murmansk region, who died on May 22 at the Herzen Institute in the capital, was remembered by Russians after her dialogue with the head of state on June 15. The girl struggled with stage IV cancer in the almost complete absence of qualified medical care, but the forces were not equal.
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Dasha's story touched millions of people. Until recently, everyone believed that a miracle would happen, that soon her little daughter would be next to her mother again.
Dasha was left an orphan early on - her mother died, and practically nothing is known about her father. She was raised by her older brother, and after 18 years old she began to live independently and soon gave birth to a daughter. The child's father refused to take part in the baby's fate.
According to the girl’s friend Svetlana Morozova, Dasha was always a cheerful and cheerful person and laughed very contagiously. When her daughter grew up a little, Daria went to work. At first she worked as a conductor, and then became a salesperson in one of the local stores.
Aunt Lyubov Tulupova helped her with the child, who will now become the girl’s guardian, Moskovsky Komsomolets reports. “It all started absolutely out of the blue. For no apparent reason, Dashka’s back started to hurt. Nothing helped, so she decided to go to the doctor,” recalled another friend of the girl, Maria. And then Dasha’s medical history was known: she was given an incorrect diagnosis, which was why precious time was lost.
The cancer diagnosis was a shock for Starikova, but she decided to fight to the end. “She always loved life very much, she knew how to enjoy little things, things that many others simply do not pay attention to,” said Dasha’s friend.
Almost immediately after turning to Vladimir Putin, Daria was transported for treatment to Moscow, where the best oncologists in the country tried to save her. “At first her messages were completely hopeless, it seemed that she did not believe that anything could help. But after the operation, before the New Year, it seemed to me that she had hope for recovery. She wrote that she began to gain weight, she felt "I felt better and even started making plans. I kept thinking about how I would come to my daughter for the holiday with gifts," a friend shared.
According to a distant relative of Dasha, she dreamed of taking her daughter to first grade on September 1. But the insidious disease won... Daria Starikova will be buried in her native Apatity.
A briefing was held at the Moscow Scientific Research Institute of Oncology named after P. A. Herzen with the participation of Daria Starikova from Apatity, who, during a “direct line” with Vladimir Putin, spoke about her cancer, and Academician Andrei Dmitrievich Kaprin, General Director of the Federal State Budgetary Institution “ National Medical Research Center of Radiology" of the Russian Ministry of Health.
A resident of the city of Apatity, Murmansk region, 24-year-old Daria Starikova, who was diagnosed with stage 4 cancer, during the “direct line” appealed to Vladimir Putin with a request to eliminate the consequences of the health care reform, which prevented her from making a correct diagnosis in a timely manner and providing her with quality treatment.
According to Daria Starikova, time for her treatment was lost because doctors initially tried to treat her for another disease. The correct diagnosis was made only after her health condition deteriorated greatly and the girl was admitted to the hospital.
“We do not have enough specialized specialists, thanks to whom it would be possible to diagnose people on time. Our maternity hospital was closed, the surgical department was closed, the cardiology department was closed, everything was moved to a neighboring city.
We have to go and seek help there, and also for difficult operations, we are sent to Murmansk for the necessary examinations - this is a five-hour drive from us,” she told the president.
As Vladimir Putin said, a similar story happened at one time with his father - doctors also could not recognize his cancer for a long time, but in the end they managed to diagnose the disease and find effective medicines.
According to the president, despite a significant number of medical facilities commissioned in recent years, the lack of specialists remains a serious problem.
“But finally, the most important thing is to ensure accessibility. This is the number one task in medicine today – to ensure accessibility of medical care,” said Vladimir Putin, promising to understand the situation with the organization of medical care in the region, as well as to provide assistance in solving the problems of Daria Starikova.
As a result of the “direct line” with the president, a criminal case was opened in the Murmansk region on the grounds of a crime under Part 1 of Art. 293 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation (negligence).
Russian oncologists saved the life of Dasha Starikova with stage 4 cancer
According to Daria Starikova, Andrei Dmitrievich is the person who gave her life, gave her hope for the future, and this is the most valuable gift. “I will always be grateful to the people who fight for my life, treat me and support me,” said Daria. “I have always believed that miracles happen, and my example is proof of this.”
At home, where Daria is going for the New Year holidays, her family and friends are waiting, as well as her five-year-old daughter, who really misses her mother, because she hasn’t been home for six months. “I want to surprise her,” Daria smiled. “She opens the door and mom is there.”
“I’m glad that the country’s leadership trusts us, that they did not send the patient abroad,” said A.D. Kaprin. “We constantly felt help and support from the President of the Russian Federation and the Minister of Health.”
During this time, the doctors became friends with Daria. She underwent a major radical operation to remove the tumor, and the PET-CT study did not reveal its presence. The treatment is not completed; reconstructive surgery is due in a few months.
Daria underwent several courses of chemotherapy with combination drugs (domestic generics and imported drugs) both before and after the operation. Many consultations took place, and, as Academician Kaprin emphasizes, this applies not only to Dasha: “We never refuse each other in difficult cases, we consult, and make decisions together. Dasha is a great guy, a courageous and patient person. The patient’s faith in us is very important; it is an integral part of successful treatment.”
The history of Daria Starikova’s treatment is a common occurrence for the national cancer center. This is why such scientific institutions are created to solve such problems, believes A.D. Kaprin. More specialists who have the necessary experience accumulate here, and complex, expensive equipment is concentrated here.
The very course of Daria’s illness was a difficult task for doctors, explained Academician Kaprin. A tumor of such localization is usually heterogeneous, that is, it can be represented by more than one pool of cells and develop very quickly.
For example, at the Institute. Herzen is currently observing two girls in whom no more than two weeks have passed from the moment of detection to the moment of tumor progression. And there are frozen tumors that do not develop for a long time. To identify all these features, you need sophisticated equipment, which Apatity does not have.
During treatment, three or four specialists worked with Daria. A morphologist who talks about the type of tumor and how treatable it is. Clinical pharmacist. A clinical oncologist or chemotherapist who decides, together with the surgeon, how and when to carry out therapy. It is finally the radiation therapist who decides whether and to what extent his treatment will be required.
“The combination of all these specialists is our basic oncological law, so we always say how important it is to be in the hospital under our supervision,” emphasized Academician Kaprin. – Moreover, we invited several specialists from abroad and communicated via teleconference.
We conferred with colleagues - for example, from the Scientific Center for Obstetrics, Gynecology and Perinatology named after. Academician V.I. Kulakov, headed by Academician G.T. Dry. Our famous chemotherapists, Academician M.R., took part in the treatment. Lichinitser from the Russian Cancer Research Center named after. Blokhina, V.I. Borisov, Chief Chemotherapist of the Ministry of Health of the Russian Federation. He and I often discuss patients, and we never hear a refusal.”
In the postoperative period, specialists from the Federal State Budgetary Institution “Federal Research Center for Nutrition and Biotechnology” came to consult Daria, since the patient had critically low body weight. She was watched and actively helped by rehabilitation specialists, clinical psychologists from the Institute of Forensic Psychiatry named after.
Serbsky, because at first the mood was depressive. Gradually, the young girl was pulled out of her illness, and now, in her own words, she increasingly wants to look into the future and make life plans.
“Dasha is far from the only patient with this type of pathology,” emphasized A.D. Kaprin. – I personally operate on about 25 of these girls every year. At the radiological center in Obninsk, we take on approximately 50 such patients a year, and in total we treat approximately 100-120 patients with similar diagnoses.
We are open to everyone, we work according to quotas, so we take in severe patients right away, realizing that for now there is little help for them. The geography is the most extensive - from Kaliningrad to Kamchatka. Therefore, you should not think that the attitude towards Dasha was somehow special. No – we try to help everyone who needs it.”
As Andrei Dmitrievich said, the united consortium of three institutes, which he heads, is the most advanced oncology center today. Every year, up to 12 thousand people undergo surgery here, and 36 thousand people are treated here.
“We take on everything from neurotumors to bone tumors, lymphoma, gynecologic oncology, urology, thoracic, abdominal patients with abdominal tumors and so on.”
However, it is clear that it is impossible to help all those in need at one cancer center, even such a powerful one. Andrei Dmitrievich admitted that there is a problem of an acute shortage of specialists locally and, of course, this problem must be solved without relying on a miracle, which happened to Daria Starikova, who managed to get through to the president of the country.
“We have nothing,” Daria emphasized. – In order to get help from an oncologist, you need to go to Murmansk. True, I heard that now, thanks to the intervention of Vladimir Putin, a chemotherapy department is being opened in Apatity, so the situation is slowly changing. But I would still like more serious changes so that no one repeats my experience.”
The lack of specialists for the regions is very serious. Andrei Dmitrievich pins great hopes here on the recently issued Law on Telemedicine. Minister of Health of the Russian Federation V.I. Skvortsova calls on doctors and scientists to conduct teleconferences and create telecommunications.
“For two years now we have been holding such events with thirty regions every Tuesday morning,” shared A.D. Kaprin. “We ask all our colleagues to show seriously ill patients and decide together which of them we take to our place. With the help of such telecommunications, we are going to significantly expand the reach of cancer patients across the country.”
At the same time, according to A.D. Caprina, the situation in the regions is changing for the better. “There are well-armed regions where we are getting fewer and fewer patients,” he said. – Oncology must be equipped with complex, expensive equipment and must employ competent specialists. It is very important".
The other day, according to Andrei Dmitrievich, the Institute named after. Herzen is launching a project with Japanese colleagues, during which they will send pre-scanned glasses with histological samples of the tumor for morphological consultations.
Academician Kaprin plans to implement the same program with regions where there is a large shortage of morphologists, but this is where everything in oncology begins - with recognizing the type of tumor, and therefore searching for those methods with which it can be cured.
“We will seat all our specialists and solve these problems together so that our beautiful young women no longer have the need to call the president of the country about this,” concluded A.D. Kaprin.
Video: Cancer patient brought to Moscow from Apatity feels better
Daria Starikova (Apatity) - fight for life. Latest news (updated 05/22/2018)
MURMANSK, May 22. /TASS/. Daria Starikova, who last year contacted Vladimir Putin’s Direct Line, died of cancer in Moscow. The head of the Apatity city administration, Nikolai Bova, told TASS about this.
“Dasha is gone<…>She died in Moscow at the Herzen Cancer Center,” he said.
Bova added that information about the death was received on Tuesday morning. “We won’t just help, we’ll do it. Of course, we are sending Dasha off on his last journey with great dignity. The main assistance will be provided by Phosagro; what depends on the administration has already been done,” the agency’s interlocutor clarified.
He also explained that the municipal administration helped with the registration of guardianship of Dasha’s seven-year-old daughter and a survivor’s pension for the aunt. “She will be buried in the city of Apatity.<…>I don’t know the exact date, but we are doing this and will do everything very well,” said the head of the Apatity administration.
As the press service of the governor of the Murmansk region told TASS, the regional authorities, the administration of Apatity and the Apatit plant will provide assistance to the family of the deceased. “The regional and municipal authorities, as well as the city-forming enterprise Apatit, will provide assistance to Daria’s family,” said the governor’s press secretary Anna Bulatova.
Daria Starikova, who suffers from cancer, and the medical situation in Apatity became widely known after her call to the Direct Line to Russian President Vladimir Putin on June 15, 2017. She said that she was late diagnosed with stage four cancer; before that, she had been treated for a long time for osteochondrosis, and was given massage and injections, which is contraindicated for oncology.
They were able to give her an accurate diagnosis only in Murmansk. Starikova also complained about the lack of a hospital, specialized specialists and other problems in the city. (Updated May 22, 2018 Source tass.ru)
Daria Starikova, a 24-year-old resident of the city of Apatity with stage 4 oncology, addressed the President of the Russian Federation during the “Direct Line”, in a short phrase she diagnosed our healthcare: “We want to live, not survive.” Her story, alas, is typical and tragically highlights the systemic problems of today's Russian medicine. Which ones exactly, Ogonyok found out.
Natalia Nekhlebova
If Dasha had not been caught on camera during “Direct Line” with Vladimir Putin, she could easily have been called a collective image of a not-so-prosperous girl from a small Russian town. Orphan - mother died early (father is unknown), raised by older brother. She graduated from 9th grade, at the age of 18 she gave birth to a daughter, the child’s father refused to take part in his fate. Dasha worked as a bus conductor, then as a salesperson, her aunt helped with her daughter - life is no worse, but clearly no better than most. The context is fitting: the regional center of Apatity next to the world's largest deposit of the mineral of the same name (apatite - a raw material for the production of phosphate fertilizers), the Belaya River, shabby five-story buildings, Lenin Square, a processing plant, the Arctic, hills...
Disease history
One day the girl had a backache. Then the pain began to recur. I made an appointment with the doctor. 55 thousand people live in Apatity. And like in the vast majority of small towns, the hospital has been optimized here since 2013. The departments of gynecology, surgery, traumatology, cardiology, and the maternity hospital were closed. All that remained was the clinic and the antenatal clinic. “We fought for this hospital as best we could,” says Dasha’s friend Anna Tikhokhod, “we wrote letters to the Ministry of Health. There was no point.” There are queues at the clinic. Crowds of elderly people stand behind coupons.
Daria was diagnosed with osteochondrosis. For further examination we were sent to a hospital in Kirovsk (20 km from Apatity). They confirmed it, prescribed massages and ointments. When bleeding began after six months of treatment, the girl was taken to a regional hospital in Murmansk (five hours from Apatity). There it turned out that she had stage 4 cancer. Dasha is 24 years old. How will events develop next? Even non-specialists are in the know: waiting for hospitalization, examinations, tests, obtaining medications...
“There are standards established by the state guarantee program that determine how long a cancer patient should expect help,” Nikolai Dronov, chairman of the executive committee of the “Movement Against Cancer,” tells Ogonyok, “but here they are often exceeded. From diagnosis to the start of treatment, it can take two months pass, and three. We had a case where a person waited a year. The fight is on for every free pill, for every free hospitalization. People seek the required treatment through the courts." Daria managed to speed things up by addressing the president live.
Her message was seen by the whole country: “Everything has been closed here. There are not enough specialized specialists, thanks to whom it would be possible to diagnose people on time. They are sent to Murmansk for the necessary examinations. Sometimes the ambulance does not have time to get there...” Immediately after the broadcast, Dasha burst into tears, and the regional authorities shuddered and showed miracles of activity.
Marina Kovtun, the head of the region, rushed to Apatity, promptly visited Aunt Dasha, promised to send her daughter Sonechka to a good summer camp, then received the population at the hospital and listened to complaints. A day later, the regional Minister of Health Valery Peretrukhin was already sitting in Apatity along with his deputies - they received people for two days. Then the baton of welcoming the population in the “exposed” city passed to the deputy head physician of the Murmansk Oncology Center. And the Investigative Committee opened a case of “medical negligence”, and the head doctor of the hospital in Kirovsk resigned. Who else is to blame?
But here’s an important detail: even before submitting his resignation after this whole story, the chief doctor of the Kirov hospital (we remind you that he also serves Apatity) confirmed that his medical institution is only 62 percent staffed with doctors. There is no regional oncologist in the states: all tests and examinations are 200 km away, in Murmansk.
And one more piece of evidence for understanding the picture.
“More than half (60.9 percent) of medical workers believe that their professional workload has increased in 2016 and the first quarter of 2017, and they cite the optimization of medical organizations (77.5 percent) as the reason for this,” the director of the Foundation for Independent Monitoring of Medical services and human health protection “Health” Eduard Gavrilov.— At the same time, the absolute majority (92.7 percent) of health workers believe that the increase in the professional workload assigned to them negatively affects the quality of the medical care they provide.
The right is there. No money
Numbers
Free help for cancer patients - paper declaration. In fact, almost half of the regions of the Russian Federation are reducing the cost of medicines for them. This is the list of entities with the largest decrease in funding (%)
Sakhalin region 47.9
Khanty-Mansiysk Autonomous Okrug 47.9
Magadan region 39.0
Kalmykia 38.5
Saratov region 35.8
Kemerovo region. 33.2
Udmurtia 32.2
Ingushetia 29.7
Primorsky Krai 29.1
Tula region 27.8
Source: Research Institute of Healthcare Organization and Medical Management
No one responsible
“Incorrect diagnosis is not a mass phenomenon, but it cannot be called a rare exception either,” says Nikolai Dronov. “In the conditions in which medical workers have to work today, I would not make all the claims to the doctor who treated Daria. Questions are necessary ask the Murmansk governor, his deputy for social issues, the head of the health organization department in the region. For example, where are the district oncologists in their region? They should organize the work of doctors of other specialties to identify the risk of oncology in district hospitals, locally. And this question can be asked in many subjects."
However, it is not only regional officials who need to be called to account. It's no secret that oncology is the most expensive branch of medicine. Colossal amounts of money are required. Tablets can cost from 500 thousand to 10 million rubles. And here the federal Ministry of Health washes its hands. Because legally he's not actually... responsible for helping cancer patients. The Federal Ministry of Health simply issued an order according to which all patients with oncology must be provided with free treatment. And the regions must do this. The directive is wonderful. But it’s paper. It does not contain recommendations on what to do if a region has money problems. But the majority have a deficit budget. And even treatment prescribed in federal hospitals can be canceled in the region for a trivial reason - because there are no funds for it.
Exemplary punishments will not change anything. We need a national systemic plan to combat cancer
Real life is not regulated in any way by instructions, it simply is - in fact. And one can only be surprised that in Ryazan, for example, there is no surgical department in the oncology clinic and operations are performed by general surgeons in a regular hospital. It's like a dentist operating on a broken jaw.
Now let’s get back to the specific subject: why wasn’t Dasha from Apatity sent for examination to Murmansk? The reason may be this: “The more patients, the more expensive it is for the state,” says Nikolai Dronov. “And in a number of cases we are simply faced with the fact that the diagnosis is not specified. People are not sent for further examination. This has happened even in Moscow.”
The situation when you have to fight for treatment, which according to all instructions is due to citizens of the Russian Federation and should be free, is typical not only for oncology patients. According to the Movement Against Cancer and the Union of Public Associations of Patients, thousands of requests a year are received by the federal Ministry of Health about the fact that the regions do not provide free treatment. The Federal Ministry of Health regularly responds: it sends complaints to regional departments. And the regions answer: there is no money. Patients also go to court (they usually sue the regional Ministry of Health), but even when they win the case, they hit a wall: there is no money... And so this bureaucratic gimmick continues with an inevitably tragic ending: departments point at each other until until the person dies. And there is no one to blame either.
“Exemplary punishments will not change anything,” says Dronov. “We need a national systemic plan to combat cancer. We have been writing about this to various authorities for several years now.” Apparently they will continue to write.
And Dasha was taken by a special plane of the Ministry of Emergency Situations to the Institute named after. Herzen in Moscow. According to her friend, she is cheerful and does not lose hope. There is no doubt that they will now do everything possible for her, and there is only one thing left: to wish her recovery.
But what can we wish for the people who remain to live in Apatity? Even after the scandal, they no longer hope that all the necessary doctors will be returned to them: “They’ll talk and forget,” they comment doomedly on social networks. And we’re not just talking about residents of one regional city. There are many such addresses in Russia, where thousands of people with “complex” diagnoses - oncology, HIV, Hunter syndrome, mucopolysaccharidosis - cannot wait for treatment or wait six months to see a specialist. What do you wish for them? Is there really no other way out than the one that Dasha Starikova fortunately had - to get to the microphone on the next “Direct Line” of the president?..
A briefing was held at the Moscow Scientific Research Institute of Oncology named after P. A. Herzen, at which the patient and the doctor talked about how the treatment was carried out Photo: Andrey MINAEV
“MIRACLES STILL HAPPEN”
“I want to thank the wizard who gave me a second life and hope for the future,” Dasha smiles, looking at oncologist Andrei Kaprin. - Miracles still happen.
On Tuesday morning, a briefing was held at the Moscow Scientific Research Institute of Oncology named after P. A. Herzen, at which the patient and the doctor talked about how the treatment was carried out and what was achieved. Dasha was operated on by Doctor of Medical Sciences, Honored Doctor of the Russian Federation, Academician of the Russian Academy of Sciences, head of the National Medical Research Center of Radiology of the Ministry of Health of the Russian Federation (the Center includes the Herzen Institute), oncologist surgeon Andrey Kaprin.
Now I feel just great compared to the state in which I arrived here for six months,” says Dasha. - My thoughts are completely different, I can look into the future and make plans. At the moment I am planning to go home for the New Year holidays. I want to spend time with my family, my beloved 6-year-old daughter Sonya. Then I will return and continue treatment.
A cancer patient from Apatity who turned to Putin will celebrate the New Year at home with her family
HOW WE WERE TREATED
This summer, 24-year-old Dasha, who called the President on the Direct Line, was brought to the Institute in serious condition. Herzen with a gynecological oncological diagnosis. It seemed that the chances of survival were slim.
The tumor was large; a major operation was required, which took more than 4.5 hours,” says Professor Kaprin. - Before and after the operation there were courses of chemotherapy, first to reduce the tumor, and then to consolidate the success after its removal. We used both imported drugs and Russian generic drugs.
In a few months, Dasha will undergo reconstructive surgery (to restore the removed tissue. - Author), which will be much easier than the first, since the tumor is no longer there. Then rehabilitation and regular monitoring will begin. According to international standards, patients of this profile come for examination once every three months in the first year, then once every six months for 3 years, and once a year, starting from the 4th year.
The most important and inspiring news: as shown by a recent control PET study (positron emission tomography, the most reliable diagnostic method today. - Author), there is no tumor or metastases in the girl’s body.
Dasha’s patience, courage and her trust in us were of great importance - the patient’s faith in doctors makes an important contribution to the victory over the disease,” emphasizes Dr. Kaprin.
WHO WAS PART OF THE “RESCUE TEAM”
As the professor said, in general, a large team of specialists from different fields was involved in the diagnosis and treatment of Dasha Starikova.
There is a basic oncology law, according to which the fate of a patient’s treatment should be decided by at least three, but more often than not, four people,” explains Andrey Kaprin. The rescue team includes:
A morphologist, that is, a doctor who determines the type of tumor: he says what kind of tumor the patient has and how much it will respond to this or that type of pre- or postoperative treatment, how it will respond to radiological treatment;
Clinical pharmacist (clinical oncologist) - decides on chemotherapy;
Radiation therapist - determines whether radiation therapy will be needed and what type.
We also consulted remotely with colleagues from abroad,” continues Kaprin. - Now this is not uncommon; we deal with about 12 - 15 of the most complex patients a year in this way. In Dasha’s case, our colleagues from South Korea and Gratz (Austria) participated in the extended consultation via teleconference. Experts from the Institute, which heads Academician Gennady Tikhonovich Sukhikh(National Medical Research Center for Obstetrics, Gynecology and Perinatology named after Academician V.I. Kulakov. - Author), our famous chemotherapists, including Vasily Ivanovich Borisov, chief chemotherapist of the Russian Ministry of Health.
After the operation, specialists from the Institute of Nutrition became involved because Dasha had critically low body weight. Now the girl has gained 5 kg. Clinical psychologists from the Institute also helped. Serbsky - they mentally prepared the patient for the operation and relieved her of stress in the future.
ASKING QUESTION
What are the chances for patients who have not reached the president?
Considering the 4th stage of cancer that Dasha Starikova was admitted with, her salvation looks like a real miracle. But Professor Kaprin does not consider this case to be anything extraordinary: “Every year I myself operate on about 25 patients with this diagnosis, and about 100 - 120 patients in a similar condition receive successful treatment in our Radiology Center.”
And yet, Daria was saved by a large team of the best specialists - what are the chances for ordinary patients who do not call the President on the Direct Line?
We are open and work according to federal quotas - patients come to us from all regions of Russia,” says Andrey Kaprin, head of the Radiology Center. - In severe cases, like Dasha’s, we take patients quickly, because we understand that there are few places that can help them - after all, federal and national centers have a larger arsenal of methods and are designed specifically for complex cases, in order to then replicate the treatment experience throughout the entire country.
At the same time, we often visit the regions and see that the situation is changing. Now there are regions that are very well equipped with equipment and specialists, from where fewer and fewer severe patients are coming to us - people can be successfully treated locally. In addition, a law on telemedicine was recently passed; Health Minister Veronika Skvortsova is constantly encouraging us to conduct teleconsultations. For two years now, we have been organizing teleconferences with the regions twice a week, asking them to show us seriously ill patients, consulting, and deciding whom to take.
Cooperation with foreign colleagues is also being actively established. In particular, we have a project with Japanese specialists that is starting just the other day. We will send each other glasses (with samples of tumor cells. - Author) for morphological consultations (that is, determining the type of tumors). Now this is done quite simply: the glass is scanned and the image is sent in any extension. We can do the same program with our regions. Because there are not enough morphologists, and everything starts with an accurate diagnosis, and the chances of treatment success primarily depend on this.
NUMBERS
About 36 thousand people a year are treated at the institutes of the National Medical Research Center of Radiology of the Ministry of Health of the Russian Federation (the Center includes the Herzen Institute);
12 thousand people operate in the Center’s units.
“Hello, Vladimir Vladimirovich. My name is Daria Starikova, I’m 24 years old...” On June 15, during the President’s direct line, a fragile girl from Apatity, Murmansk region, became famous throughout the country. A heartfelt story
Dasha's story about the fight against stage IV cancer in the almost complete absence of qualified medical care touched millions of people.
When the girl was sent for treatment to Moscow and the first good news began to arrive, we all hoped for a miracle. They hoped that Dasha could be saved, that her little daughter would be next to her mother again. Unfortunately, real miracles only happen in fairy tales, and even the president is still not an omnipotent wizard.
Just recently, on New Year’s Eve, Dasha Starikova, together with her attending doctors, gave a press conference. After a successful operation, it seemed that she had every chance of recovering and returning to normal life. “It’s hard, it’s mentally hard, but people, never give up! Still, we have to fight!” - a resident of Apatity then addressed the whole country. Then messages about the girl’s health began to arrive less and less often, and suddenly, like a bolt from the blue: Dasha passed away at the Institute. Herzen.
A resident of Apatity, a mining town of 50,000 people in the Murmansk region, was left an orphan early - her mother died, and practically nothing is known about her father. In fact, Dasha was raised by her older brother, and after 18 years old she began to live independently and soon gave birth to a daughter, Sonechka. True, the child’s father refused to take part in the baby’s fate, so Daria raised the girl alone.
We talked to Dasha when we were at school, we were the same age, but she studied a grade lower, we lived in neighboring houses, walked in the yard and shared girlish secrets,” recalls her friend Svetlana Morozova. - Then I left for another city, but regularly visited Apatity and met with Dasha.
The last time we saw her was 3 years ago, when I came home again. She did not yet know about her illness. They drank tea, talked heart to heart, she talked all the time about her daughter Sonya, she loved her very much. We remembered the old times, childhood.
Dasha has always been a cheerful and cheerful person, she laughed so contagiously, I will remember her laughter for the rest of my life... This year I wrote to her on March 24th on her birthday, but she never responded to my congratulations...
When her daughter grew up a little, Daria went to work, first as a conductor, and then became a salesperson in one of the local stores. Her aunt, Lyubov Tulupova, helped her with the child (it was she who became Sonya’s guardian after her mother’s death). This is how Dasha’s life went on until the girl learned about the terrible diagnosis. “It all started absolutely out of the blue,” says Dasha’s other friend, Maria. - For no apparent reason, Dashka’s back started to hurt. Nothing helped, so she decided to go to the doctor.
In our city, like in many others, the hospital was closed five years ago as part of optimization, leaving only a antenatal clinic and a clinic. Both at the clinic and at the hospital in the neighboring city, Dasha was diagnosed with osteochondrosis and prescribed ointments and massages. But a few months later, my friend began bleeding heavily. She was sent to the Murmansk hospital, which was 5 hours away.
It was there that they made the terrible diagnosis of cancer, already stage IV. Naturally, this was a shock for Dasha, but she decided to fight to the end. She always loved life very much, knew how to enjoy little things, things that many others simply do not pay attention to. More than once after talking with her, my pessimistic mood disappeared.
Obviously, the last straw for the girl was an appeal to the president of the country. What most struck those who heard Daria Starikova’s appeal was that the girl was asking not for herself, but for other residents of her region who might find themselves in a similar situation. The girl’s appeal was recorded against the backdrop of the hospital’s unfinished surgery building, which was supposed to be operational back in the 90s, but eventually became a refuge for the homeless.
“Everything was closed here. There are not enough specialized specialists, thanks to whom it would be possible to diagnose people in a timely manner. They are sent to Murmansk for the necessary examinations. Sometimes the ambulance doesn’t have time to deliver... I’m not asking for myself, I’m asking for the city, for our residents, for all the people. We want to live, not survive. We ask you to please help!” - as soon as the live broadcast ended, Dasha burst into tears.
Almost immediately after this, Daria was transported for treatment to Moscow, where the best oncologists in the country tried to save her.
At first, her messages were completely hopeless; it seemed that she did not believe that anything could help, Maria recalls. - But after the operation, before the New Year, it seemed to me that she had hope for recovery. She wrote that she began to gain weight, felt better and even began to make plans. I kept thinking about how she would come to her daughter for a holiday with gifts... The last time a message came from her was at the end of December, she then wrote that a lot of people were calling and writing to her and she simply did not have time to answer everyone, she said that perhaps doctors will allow her to go home for the holidays.
A distant relative of the girl told us how little Sonya feels now and whether she knows that her mother is no more.
Sonya has been living with Dasha's aunt since she got sick. The girl feels good in this family, she doesn’t need anything. Naturally, it is the aunt who will become the girl’s official guardian. Of course, in recent weeks we all understood that the end was near, but we still can’t believe that Dasha is no more. She so dreamed of being able to take her daughter Sonechka to 1st grade on September 1, but she didn’t have enough strength.
Daria Starikova will be buried in her native Apatity. Many townspeople are going to come to see off the girl on her last journey, who, before her death, tried to do everything to ensure that help always came to other sick people on time.
