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Translation of Segments of Materials Published in
June issue of UNICEF/Ministry of Public Health Publication
Issue of June 2001
Introduction:
The
introduction notes that this is the first issue of this publication, which
will be issued periodically to report on the development of the UNICEF
initiative, “Baby Friendly Hospital”, a special designation of hospitals
by UNICEF. This issue deals
primarily with the promotion and benefits of breast-feeding.
The Committee for health protection and the center for the protection
of mothers and infants of the Volgograd oblast with the support of the
ministry of health prepared this first issue. The publication bears the UNICEF
seal and a letter of endorsement by the UNICEF representative for Russia,
Belarus, and Ukraine, Rosemarie MacCreary as well as the Ministry of Health of
the Russian Federation..
Point
on the Map- Volgograd oblast
Description
of the Region
The
area of the Volgograd Oblast is 113.9 thousand square kilometers, population
is 2,615 persons. The Volgograd
Oblast is a typical territory of Russia in which every year is born more than
21000 infants. Across the
territory of the oblast are 40 birthing hospitals and clinics of different
kinds, in each of which takes place from 100 to 3000 births per year. One of each three of the birthing facilities has been awarded
the title “Baby Friendly Hospital”. In
the year 2000 the number of beds accommodating both mother and the child in
the same room grew to 99% of the total.
Statement
of Mikhail Nikolaev Kirichenko, chief doctor of the oblast clinical perinatal
center, candidate of medical science, honored doctor of the Russian
Federation.
In 1999 our perinatal center received the international and national
diploma “Baby Friendly Hospital”. The
advantage of breast-feeding for healthy infants is obvious and has been
described many times. One of the
tasks of our institution, where we concentrate on high risk pregnant women
from the entire region of the Volgograd oblast has been the creation of the
concept of breast feeding for sick new-borns, whose mothers have serious
physical/somatic pathology or serious pregnancy complications.
In these instances the use of medical preparative is unavoidable, but
certainly many of them (for example blood pressure lowering agents,
antibacterial preparatives and so forth) running through the milk of mother to
the infant can bring forth in the infant drowsiness and apathy, breaking up
the process of sucking, and the development of malfunctioning bacteria to aid
the digestive process, leading to dyspepsia.
How to preserve breast-feeding and decrease the negative consequences
of drug therapy? The task was
resolved with the help of a broad introduction of epidural anesthesia (up to
56% in use of anesthesia applications), the use of lymphotropic and
homeopathic therapy for the mother giving birth at an early stage, and also
together with these methodological approaches to individual breast-feeding.
Today 98.6% of infants are recorded as discharged from our center
exclusively on breast-feeding.
*
Translator’s note: The Perinatal Center also has, through its affiliate in
Mikhailovka, supervisory responsibilities for 9 more districts in the
northwest part of the oblast. See remarks
of Dr. Alexander Bukhtin of 11/16/01
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