The Atlanta - Tbilisi Healthcare Partnership

Home

Introduction

Accomplishments

Future Plans

Trip Reports

Partners

Problems:

Problems:

• Antiquated medical curriculum, circa 1930's
• Students have little clinical involvement; mostly observers
• Little or no exposure to modern technology and its results
• Students ill-prepared for medicine of year 2000

Problems:

• Minimal access to information outside of Georgia
• Distance and difficulty of travel make visiting academicians scarce
• Urgent need for sessions by and with professors and other experts not in Georgia

Problems:

• Economy in chaos
• Few managers able to operate in a market economy
• 70% of population live below subsistence minimum
• Foreign investment per capita, $37: compared with $112 across former Soviet Union
• Transition from Soviet planned economy to free market economy

Problems:

• A major public health problem in the Republic of Georgia
• Incidence of 100 cases per 100,000 population
• Prevalence of 200 cases per 100,000
• High rates among internally displaced persons
• Emergence of multidrug resistant tuberculosis
• Children affected in great numbers
• Lack of infrastructure, poor laboratory support
• No directly observed therapy

Problems:

• No respect for nurses or nursing
• Minimal education of nurses with few resources
• No university level education of nurses
• No licensure for nurses

Problems:

• Trauma a significant cause of death and disability
• High incidence of cardiovascular disease, especially heart attacks
• Concept of 'first responders' not present in former Soviet Union
• Enormous potential for catastrophes: earthquakes; oil pipeline rupture; nuclear accidents.

Problems:

• Birth rate 1.2 Precipitous decline since 1987
• Live births:
• 1987: 100,000
• 1999: 58,000 with 21,000 reported abortions (Figures from Jordania Institute)
• High rate of sexually transmitted diseases
• Birth control principally by abortion
• Pregnancy related mortality/morbidity higher than most of Europe
• Infant mortality high

Problems:

• Research infrastructure virtually nonexistent: academic, technology, information buildings, financial support

Problems:

• Explosive increase in IV drug abuse beginning in early 1990's
  1994: estimated 100,000 IV drug users with 1400 in prisons
• Dramatic increase in sexually transmitted diseases
• Unprotected sex and low level of safe sex education
• Inadequate surveillance of blood supply
• Adjacent to countries with high incidence of HIV

Problems:

• 10,000 amputees; roughly 5,000 from land mines
• 77% age 20-65, most are breadwinners
• 300 cheap short lasting prostheses produced per year
• Waiting list years long
• Measuring time for stumps lengthy and inaccurate

Problem:

• Emory student discovered 60% of Georgian newborns have significant hypothyroidism

Problems:

• Transition away from Soviet system occurring very slowly
• 30,000 physicians in a country with a need for about 10,000
• Licensure and credentialing for physicians and nurses just beginning
• Facilities completely inadequate: old, deteriorating, inadequately equipped
• Lack of trained healthcare managers