February 13, 2012
Mongolia
Caritas Czech Republic has set up mobile emergency rooms in rural areas of the west Mongolian Zavkhan province and provided training for local medical staff. Czech Development Agency co-financed all activities.
The representatives of the Mongolian Ministry of Health have joined the project as well as officials of the Zavkhan Province Administration located in western Mongolia, approximately 1500 km from the capital Ulaanbaatar. Caritas Czech Republic helps to solve the difficult situation in the country where many services for residents are poorly available due to large distances (Mongolia is a country with the lowest population density in the world).
In the so called somon centers (somon is an administrative unit under the provincial level – approximately equivalent to Czech district), hospitals operate with a capacity of 10 to 15 beds, where a few doctors work. Residents from the smallest villages, so called bagh, travel for many hours to get to the somonian hospital. In winter, they may not get there at all. In baghs, villagers can ask for doctors are slightly less educated than the doctors in the somonian hospital. Their consulting rooms are very poorly equipped and lack a place for receiving many patients.
Mobile emergency/consulting rooms in yurts provided by the Province Administration and equipped by Caritas Czech Republic operate in baghs and are easily accessible by locals. Medical equipment and supplies are also provided in the consulting rooms of Czech GPs. Each yurt has improved stoves, a solar power kit and an emergency diesel generator. These well-furnished yurts provide medical professionals a sufficient space for easier therapeutic and diagnostic tasks. Materials, including the yurt itself, are easy to pack up and take away. The yurts move together with the itinerant herdsmen, who mostly live in the most remote areas of the province.
By the end of 2011, in the first half of October, five medical yurts/consulting rooms began to operate in six of the most needed somons. During the first two months, local medical staff collected data about the provided services. Results will be available in 2012, which will help evaluate the project.
In November, Caritas Czech Republic organized training for 30 rural physicians in the center of the province. The training topics were based on their recommendations. The topics included urinary tract disease (very common due to the cold climate) and the care for infants. The province’s administration was also involved in organizing the training. It provided the proper place/rooms to hold the trainings in.
In January 2012, representatives of the Czech Embassy in Ulaanbaatar with the Head of Mission of Caritas Czech Republic and project manager of Caritas Czech Republic carried out monitoring of the project’s results. They visited several rooms/yurts and met with patients and medical staff. Medics explained to the embassy officials how the yurts function and informed them about the types of procedures performed.
Most cases deal with colds and minor injuries. Medics provide prenatal care to pregnant women and conducted testing for syphilis, brucellosis, and diabetes. Several dozen people with serious diagnoses are sent for further examination or treatment to provincial hospitals or somonian or in specialized facilities in Ulaanbaatar.
In 2012, more remote rural locations will also benefit from the medical yurts. The province’s administration considers the chosen model to be very effective and has a great interest in its expansion into the largest possible number of baghs that hardly have any available medical care. The aim of the government is to eventually equip all baghs in Zavkhan with the medical yurts. Caritas Czech Republic plans to create 14 new yurts and hold two more training sessions for rural health professionals this year.
