EFSUMB Newsletter meets Russia

Inhaltsübersicht

Facts on Russia

• Area: 17,075,400 km²

• Capital and largest city: Moscow

• Population: 142 million

• EFSUMB members: 266

Professor Vladimir Mitkov

The Russian Association of Specialists in Ultrasound Diagnostic in Medicine joined EFSUMB in 1996. The current interview between the president and delegate Professor Vladimir Mitkov and the Editor of the EFSUMB Newsletter, Professor Michael Bachmann Nielsen took place in March 2009. Professor Vladimir Mitkov is the director of Diagnostic Ultrasound Department of the Russian Medical Academy for Advanced Studies.

"Our department is the biggest diagnostic ultrasound training centre in Russia - annually on various courses we train about 900 doctors not only from Russia, but from former Soviet Republics also. I ended up in diagnostic ultrasound by chance. After postgraduate course in nuclear medicine I did scientific research in order to receive the philosophy doctor degree. At the end of 1983 the nuclear medicine department got an ultrasound diagnostic system. It was Autofocus II (Technicare, USA). I was the youngest doctor in the department. So since then I involved in ultrasound."

The Russian Association of Specialists in Ultrasound

The Association has been founded in 1991. Doctors of any specialty can be members of our Association if they perform ultrasound examinations.

"By our calculations about a third of the doctors performing ultrasound daily are members of our Association. Currently we have more than 4,500 members and we are growing". Nearly all members are from Russia, only about 120 from the former Soviet republics. A lot of doctors do not know English and for them the idea of being a member of EFSUMB is not so attracting, therefore the number of Russian members who are also part of EFSUMB is considerably smaller.

Like in most European countries most of the doctors in Russia are state employed, but the amount of private clinics has quickly grown the last 10-12 years in Russia.

The official Russian journal

"We have the official journal "Ultrasound and Functional Diagnostics", published 6 volumes a year (128 pages in volume)." The journal is in Russian. In the Russian Federation live more than 180 nationalities speaking different languages. Russian language is the State language and all inhabitants of Russia may read, write and speak it.

A lot of doctors in Russia do not know English. We will try to organize subscription to Ultraschall in der Medizin/European Journal of Ultrasound, however, I do not think that the amount of copies will be big, perhaps 100-120 copies."

Website

"Unfortunately we have no newsletter now, but plan to have one in the future. The Association has a website (www.rasudm.org) on which one can find the information about the Association, Russian and international congresses, conferences, information about educational centres in diagnostic ultrasound, etc. The website is in Russian."

Training in ultrasound in Russia

The Association does not have educational courses. In Russia for postgraduate education special state medical academies, institutes or faculties licensed for this kind of activity are responsible. To be certified to do ultrasound the doctor (only doctors can carry out ultrasound in Russia) must pass special training (duration from 4 months till 2 years) and exam.

Further to confirm certification one must pass the exam each 5 years. Training courses, which are spent by various educational centres, have a different level of complexity and focused on doctors with different level of competence. Duration of courses varies from 10 days till 1.5 months (depends on subject). Courses programs affirm Russian Ministry of Health, and they are not based on EFSUMB guidelines. Instead of educational courses we spend the congresses, conferences and seminars in various regions of our country.

Russia is divided into 8 federal districts. In each district we try to have at least one congress every two years which sums up to 3-4 congresses a year. 300-500 doctors of the region participate in the district congresses. Every four years the All-Russia congress takes place. The latest was in Moscow two years ago with more than 4,000 doctors participating.

Congress in Chelyabinsk 2008

Church of the Protecting Veil of the Mother of God on Nerly

A EUROSON in Russia - maybe

"Have you considered trying to host a EUROSON congress? Moscow would probably be very attractive." "Yes, we considered such an opportunity. Unfortunately an expocentre available today is surrounded only by very expensive hotels (mainly 5*). Cheaper hotels are located far from expocentre and difficult to reach (traffic jams in Moscow are now terrible). The new expocentre with hotel and station of the underground will be soon finished. Then we'll make an application for the organization of the congress."