Putin crossed the doors of the operating room

Russia has developed a new drug against childhood SMA

Vladimir Putin got acquainted with modern methods of brain treatment. At the Federal Center for Brain and Neurotechnologies, the president was shown how unique operations are performed on the most important organ for a person and methods are being tested that are not even available in the Kremlin hospitals.

The institution visited by Vladimir Putin has nothing to do with the famous Brain Institute, created after the death of Vladimir Lenin to study the convolutions of the leader and other prominent Russians. The brainchild of ex-Minister of Health Veronika Skvortsova is only two years old: initially it was a center for cerebrovascular pathology and stroke, but then the name was changed to a more capacious one. Moreover, they deal with the whole spectrum of brain diseases, which, by the way, there are more than 500 types.

As Veronika Skvortsova explained, the center is a fusion of several high-tech clinics. And some operations that doctors own are unique – they can be done only here and in 3-5 other clinics around the world. In order for Vladimir Putin to get the maximum impression, he was shown two types of operations – without craniotomy and on the open brain. Learning that the intervention would take about three hours, the president sighed and slowly crossed the doors of the operating room.

The most common problem that doctors have to deal with is strokes and other vascular pathologies. The population of Russia is aging, and with age, the likelihood of apoplexy increases. According to statistics, two thirds of strokes occur in people over 60 years of age. Vladimir Putin was shown how those who have lost part of their vital functions due to cerebrovascular accident are being rehabilitated. For them, doctors have developed comprehensive programs that begin as early as in intensive care and continue until the person reaches the ceiling of his capabilities. After all, not everyone comes to a full recovery after brain damage. Vladimir Putin asked how long a person hanging on special cables in a rather uncomfortable position has to do the exercises. And having learned that about 40 minutes, he was surprised: “Why so long? Ready for the podium? “It is important to return the ability to walk independently,” the rehabilitation specialists patiently explained.

However, the main feature of the center, which distinguishes it from other similar institutions, is the department of personalized medicine. This means that patients here are treated not according to standard protocols and drug regimens, but according to individual programs that are compiled taking into account the characteristics of their body. For Vladimir Putin, this approach, of course, is not new. But the center’s capabilities seem to exceed the competence of the Kremlin’s doctors. Scientists are going to create healthy brain cells from the biological materials of the patients themselves or modify diseased cells and plant them back “in a corrected form”. And, for example, in the case of oncology, the effect on tumor samples will tell doctors how and with what it is better to treat the patient.

Skvortsova told Putin that the center’s scientists had developed a drug for spinal muscular atrophy (SMA), which, with a comparable effect, would cost much less than foreign analogues. Recall that now the treatment of one child with SMA costs 150-180 million rubles. To take part in the research, many specialists specially returned from Switzerland, Scotland and Germany. “I got a great job and even managed to get married,” one of them proudly told Putin.