Noncommunicable diseases: stepping up the fight.

Abstract

The prevention and control of noncommunicable diseases is now a top priority in many countries. Sergey Boytsov tells Fiona Fleck how the Russian Federation is collaborating with other Commonwealth of Independent States' countries. [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] Sergey Boytsov is the Russian cardiologist coordinating the response to the biggest health threat facing his country: noncommunicable diseases (NCDs). In 2011, he was appointed director of the National Research Center for Preventive Medicine of the Russian Ministry of Health. Boytsov started his career as a naval doctor in the former Soviet Union, after graduating in 1980 from the Kirov Military Medical Academy in St Petersburg, where he went on to hold senior posts in naval and Internal medicine from 1984 to 2002. From 2002 to 2003, he joined the State Medical Center of the Ministry of Health as a senior physician and from 2003 to 2006, he was the executive director of the Pirogov Central Clinic in Moscow followed by five years as deputy director in charge of the scientific research at the Russian Cardiology Research and Production Complex. He has published many scientific papers on NCDs and is editor-in-chief of the Russian journal Preventive Medicine. Q: Health officials gathered last month to launch a project for the prevention and control of noncommunicable diseases in WHO's European Region that will lead to the opening of a WHO [geographically-dispersed office] in Moscow. What will the project do? A: This project is very important for the European Region. The Russian Federation has provided a grant of US$ 22 million to the WHO Regional Office for Europe over the next five years to build capacity in the European region to address the epidemic of noncommunicable diseases--cardiovascular disease, cancers, diabetes and chronic respiratory disease--that are the main killers in these countries. That means, among other things, providing technical support and training so that countries are able to draw up their own national plans to prevent and control these diseases. Q: How are Russian centres collaborating with other Commonwealth of Independent States' (CIS) countries, which were once part of the Soviet Union, on this challenge? A: The goal of our collaboration is to reduce smoking, to make peoples' diets healthier, to stop alcohol abuse and make people more physically active in our countries by exchanging information and sharing experiences on NCDs, building international networks and through data collection and analysis of cardiovascular and other diseases. Our centre--the National Research Centre for Preventive Medicine--is organizing collaborative international epidemiological projects with Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan and will soon do so with Armenia and Georgia. We are running international seminars on oncological or cardiovascular screening with Belarus and Kazakhstan. In addition, we are providing technical support to other countries. For example, we are translating WHO documents into the Russian language, such as resolutions and conference declarations, as Russian is spoken not only here in the Russian Federation but in other CIS countries. This collaboration is guided by the Global Action Plan for the prevention and control of NCDs 2013-2020 which is a great document--not just a text book--as it provides practical advice along with a timetable, indicators and goals. In addition, Moscow State Medical University is providing training on the prevention and control of these diseases and the first course was held in February last year for 25 health officials from Central Asian and east European countries. The university also provides continuing medical education for physicians from CIS countries. On the international level, our country has proposed a second global ministerial conference on healthy lifestyles and NCDs, to be held in Moscow in 2016. Q: When did noncommunicable diseases start to become a major health problem in the Russian Federation? …