Palliative Care Development in Kyrgyzstan

Abstract

Palliative care began in Kyrgyzstan in 2005 as a pilot home-based care program in Osh Cancer Center and was supported by a small group of nurses and one physician from Scotland. In 2010, the Soros Foundation-Kyrgyzstan and the Open Society Foundation's International Palliative Care Initiative began supporting work on palliative care policy, legislation, essential medicine availability, education, advocacy, and implementation. A Ministry of Health working group was established to lead this initiative, and technical assistance was provided by an international palliative care consultant. Work began with a national needs assessment, which identified the existing barriers to the provision of quality palliative care, and recommendations were made to the working group to address these challenges. Today, palliative care is included in many national health care policies and laws, a national palliative care association has been established, undergraduate medical and nursing education include elements of palliative care, oral morphine and fentanyl patches are now available in parts of the country, inpatient services exist in the National Cancer Center in Osh and Bishkek, two tuberculosis hospitals with multidrug resistant/extensively drug resistant, and home care services in Osh and Bishkek. Public information campaigns and advocacy activities continue to increase public awareness about palliative care and press government action.

Progress Update: Development of Palliative Care From 2017 to 2020 in Five Countries in Eurasia

“…5 By 2015, OSF made about US$6.2 million in grants to promote palliative care in the region directly; additionally, it engaged global experts to provide technical assistance, made global grants and organized convenings that benefited the region. [6][7][8][9][10][11][12][13] In the 2000s, countries in the region made considerable progress building the foundations for integrated palliative care services. By the mid-2010s, all countries had carried out palliative care needs assessments, established at least some palliative care education programs for health providers, and included palliative care into national health policies.…”

Postgraduate palliative care education and curricular issues in Central Asia, Eastern and South-Eastern Europe: Results from a quantitative study

“…There is a disparity of palliative care in the European area of WHO [14][15][16][17][18][19]. This gap in delivery and services is reflected in general developments in palliative care education as well as in specific developments in postgraduate education and training [20][21][22][23][24]. The recent Lancet Commission Report on Palliative Care and Pain Relief emphasised the importance of training and capacity building for the "system-wide integration of palliative care in low-income and middle-income countries" [25].…”

The Persistence of Traditional Cradle Board (Beshik) Usage among Post-Soviet Central Asian Mothers: Survey Analysis from Southern Kyrgyzstan

“…Previous research on health care practices in Kyrgyzstan has focused on the country's post-Soviet transition to a market-based health care system, praising the country for being a "pioneer in reforming the system of health care finance (Falkingham, Akkazieva, & Baschieri, 2010;Ismailbekova & Megoran, 2020). Other contributions to the study of health care practices and provisions in contemporary Kyrgyzstan have examined the role of midwives and nurses in providing abortions, contributing to a reduction in the number of unwanted births in the country (Johnson Jr et al, 2018) and the development of palliative care (Mukambetov, Sabyrbekova, Asanalieva, Sadykov, & Connor, 2019). Shin, Lee, Lee, and Shon (2019) provide a study on community health needs assessment for a child health promotion program in Kyrgyzstan, while Dronina and Nam (2019) published a comparative study of health care systems in Kyrgyzstan, Kazakhstan, and Uzbekistan.…”