6 Kazakh citizens to take part in World Transplant Games for first time
In June a 43-year-old Uspanov together with other five recipients, the people with transplanted hearts or kidneys, intends to participate in the Transplant Games in Spain. For the first time Kazakhstan will take part in such a competition. "6 persons will go to the competition. I will participate in three sports: swimming, table tennis and bowling. Each of the other will take part in one of these sports. In a KPA session last year I told President Nazarbayev: ‘We have a dream, to run up the flag of Kazakhstan at the Games in honor of ‘Mangilik Yel' patriotic act!'", he says.
According to him, the athletes are now waiting for confirmation by the organizers. All participants have been examined for allowable physical loads. "Of course, it is not the sport we got used to. It is just a sport activity. Many years of research proved the importance of physical load for a recipient. To maintain our bodies we must take up certain loads", Uspanov says.
After the Games Zhanibek with likeminded people wants to found the National Sport Federation after Transplantation so that to declare to the world that the level of Kazakh medicine is high and to inform Kazakh citizens on transplantation capacity of returning to life. Founding the federation will give an impulse to research and will help to popularize transplantation, Uspanov thinks. In Kazakhstan we were gifted with a second life: the operation was free-of-charge and immunosuppressive medicines are also given out for free. I want to do something useful for the country and people, helping to faster comeback to society. And sport activity provides all these opportunities because sport is an everyday victory, he says.
It all started way back in 2005 when a resident of Kostanay region Zhanibek Uspanov was said that his heart disease can be slowed down with medicines but not cured of. "Every six months half a year I came to Astana and was treated, then I was told that I need transplantation. I started searching for information on the Internet and learned how much it may cost. And I closed this subject since such operations are immensely expensive abroad", he said.
According to him, in 2012 he came for another time to Astana, and at that time the Research Cardiac Surgery Center was founded with Yuryi Pya as its head. They just started operations for artificial left ventricle of heart implantation there. "I addressed to the cardiac surgery center because for the moment the medicines did no special effect. The hospitalization date was appointed for August 2. On August 7 after examination I was proposed an operation for donor heart transplantation. They warned me that the doctors have been preparing for that for a long time but have never made similar operations", he says.
It was the chance for life prolongation. As Zhanibek Uspanov says he was given time till next morning to think. And in the morning the operation started. The donor was Galina Vorotnikova, a woman who was declared brain dead. The son of Vorotnikova, Igor gave his permission for transplantation. The operation was conducted by Yuryi Pya. He transplanted her heart to Zhanibek from Kostanay region and kidney to Yevgeny from Karaganda.
After the operation Uspanov began a new life: three weeks later his daughter was born and nine months later his son came to life. "Since that time I've been living. After the operation I moved to Astana and as every human being I started thinking of how to live further, what to do to prolong my life and improve its quality. I was gifted with a new life and I want to benefit from that, do you see?!" he says.
The numbers of such ‘new' people as Zhanibek in Kazakhstan has already exceeded one thousand. Some had heart transplants, the others were given kidneys, etc. "Since it is a new phenomenon for us, few people know what lifestyle to follow after transplantation. Therefore, I began studying on how it goes in the world, went to seminars and in 2015 arranged ‘Omir Tynysy' NGO for rehabilitation of recipient patients", the interlocutor says.
Zhanibek Uspanov works as a service manager for patients with severe chronic cardiac failure in the Transplantation Coordination Department of National Research Cardiac Surgery Center. "We, consultants, carry out social work by explaining to future recipient patients what transplantation is and how to withstand it, and how their lives will change, as even doctors may not know all feelings and emotional upheavals the recipients experience before and after operation. That is the peer-to-peer principle", he says.