Medical caravans for socially vulnerable communities

The Save the Children Romania organization announces that it has made available to the Caravana cu Medici Association three mobile medical units worth 300,000 euros, equipped with equipment. So far, caravans have been organized in 13 socially vulnerable communities, ensuring access to medical services for 1,570 adults and children. The medical units made available by Save the Children are equipped with ultrasound machines with two probes and a gynecological and pediatric chair, which can be used to perform breast, thyroid, abdominal or transvaginal ultrasounds. According to the organization: "Problems of malnutrition and deficiency anemia, caused by the limited access to medical services and the vulnerability of the social environment in which they live, were diagnosed by the doctors who provide free consultations, within the medical caravans in the rural environment. The distribution of medical units and doctors in Romania is unequal between rural and urban areas, one of the consequences being an infant mortality rate in rural areas (6.8 per thousand children born) 33% higher than in urban areas". Within the caravans, vulnerable people and children have free access to specialists in various areas: paediatrics, cardiology, gynecology, general medicine, ophthalmology, but they can also benefit from blood pressure and blood sugar measurements, EKG and abdominal ultrasound, examinations that can detect a series of ailments. Following these consultations, medical letters are issued with the clinical and paraclinical results, as well as therapeutic recommendations that will be followed under the guidance of the family doctor. "For socio-economic reasons, the children were brought to the consultation by the community nurse and with the help of the analyzers and a specialist consultation, we discovered malnourished children, one of them with a normocytic hypochromic anemia. They are not SF pathologies, but the children live in difficult conditions and they haven't been to the doctor for a long time," said Vladislava Coneschi, coordinator of the Caravana cu Medici Iasi. Dr. Andra Postelnicu stated that among the most common pathologies are: acute respiratory infections, such as bronchitis and pneumonia (in the colder season), viral gastroenteritis, manifested by vomiting and diarrhea (especially among young children), deficiency anemias: "At a pediatric caravan organized in a rural area, I met a five-year-old boy who had come dressed in his best clothes: an immaculate white shirt, blue jacket and a small bow tie. When he was asked why he dressed so nicely and if he was going to church or a party after the consultation, the child answered with innocence and emotion that he had prepared especially for the medical team, which he had heard would come to help the children in his village. Excited and shy , but with eyes full of hope, he came to the medical consultation and the collection of tests.Then I discovered that he was suffering from a chronic health problem that was neglected due to limited access to medical services. His effort to prepare and look his best deeply moved the whole team, who did everything possible to provide him with the necessary care". According to INS data for 2023, in the primary medicine segment, most family medicine practices 6,200 offices operated in urban areas, compared to 4,100 offices in rural areas. A family medicine office served 1.4 times as many residents in rural areas as compared to an office in rural areas. At the same time, while, in 2023, there were 13,700 independent medical offices in the rural areas, their number was 17.3 times lower (793 offices). the population by residence, the average number of residents who returned to such a medical office was 15.8 times higher in the rural area, compared to the situation in the urban area.