One of the key tasks for the current year is the development of a primary healthcare network in the countryside. This is the initiative of President of Ukraine Petro Poroshenko, depicted in law No 2206 "On Improving Accessibility and Quality of Healthcare in Rural Areas". Our ultimate goal is to reduce the number of people’s addresses to the secondary healthcare link and to subdue 65% of cardiovascular diseases, informed Hennadii Zubko, Vice Prime Minister – Minister of Regional Development, Construction, Housing and Communal Services of Ukraine, at the expanded governmental meeting on decentralisation and regional development with the participation of President of Ukraine Petro Poroshenko, Prime Minister of Ukraine Volodymyr Groysman, representatives of the Government, heads of the OSA, city councils and AHs.

"The roadmap for the implementation of the law, which involves several ministries, primarily the Ministry of Health and MinRegion, the OSA and local self-government bodies, has been already elaborated. Besides, our international partners – the World Bank, Canada, providing support for the introduction of telemedicine – have also joined us," said Hennadii Zubko.

According to the official, the methodology for the establishment of a primary healthcare network, elaborated by MinRegion in cooperation with the Ministry of Health, has already been brought to the regions. The main criteria of the document include: full coverage of primary healthcare requests from the population, transport accessibility to primary healthcare institutions, marginal capacity, which, on average, envisages four visits of one resident of a defined territory to the institution, financial sustainability – the ability of the network to provide primary healthcare services of appropriate quality to the population of the respective territory consistently and efficiently within the limits of the available amount of financial resources.

"The regions are already forming projects of capable networks. Already 11 oblasts have approved primary healthcare networks. We expect everyone else to cope by 13 April! After approval of the available equipment list, procedure of healthcare services and the list of necessary equipment, we will be able to implement specific projects in the regions," emphasised Hennadii Zubko.

Besides, the Vice Prime Minister called the introduction of telemedicine services as an important direction. "We are getting support in this issue from OTN and General Electric. Telemedicine is an opportunity to make a really high-quality leap in the provision of medical services. And this is the main task," the official said.