Slowly, the laser beam passes over the imposing scars on the chest of Serguiï Prychtchepa, seriously injured and burned in the explosion of his car on an anti-tank mine, near Kiev, the Ukrainian capital.
The 34-year-old regularly comes for treatment in a private clinic, as part of the “Neopalymi” (“Non-flammable” in Ukrainian) project, which allows civilian or military victims of war to undergo free treatment for their severe burns and scars.
When the Russian invasion of Ukraine began in February 2022, Sergey Pryshchepa left kyiv with his wife and 10-year-old son for a village 100 km north of the capital.
But the town was bombed and on March 14 the family decided to flee again.
On the road, “our car was destroyed by an anti-tank mine. The explosion occurred on the side of my wife, who died instantly. Our son in the back was not injured”, but the child, aged 10, “suffers from a psychological trauma”, tells AFP this commercial director in an elevator company.
“The first thing I asked at the hospital was Why did my head stay?” he said, holding up a photo of his completely dislocated and charred carcass.
For 16 months, he has had skin grafts taken from his legs and several jaw and hand operations.
Now he comes regularly to the Choupenyuk clinic in kyiv, one of 19 associated with the “Neopalymi” project across the country.
“Before doing the laser treatment, we use certain drugs that soften the rough connective tissue (…) First injections, then laser grinding, and thanks to this (the scars) become thinner, lighter , less rough, softer”, explains Kateryna Bezverchenko, the dermatologist who treats Serguiï Prychtchepa.
“Half of our patients are civilians, and not just from the Kyiv region… There is a man who has just been hit by a drone in his apartment. His mother is dead, he survived, but he’s badly burned,” she said.
The dermatologist also treats Felix Rasko, 35, a volunteer engaged in the army from the start of the conflict.
He was seriously burned in the hands last October in the Donbass (east), when the building where he slept was bombed at night by the Russians.
His hands “were burning. I woke up to a heavy bang and fire, everything was on fire,” he recalled. He too underwent operations and skin grafts taken from one leg.
After a new laser session on his scars, streams of blood flow from his fingers.
“If we compare this care to that of the beginning (…) it’s now like a mosquito bite”, relativizes the young man, adding however that his hands “are constantly itching”.
“I was very lucky, from the moment these rockets flew towards us until the moment I was treated. Not everyone is treated like that,” he explains.
“Even for the ointments they give me, I don’t pay anything, everything is free, and that really helps me,” he says, while a single laser treatment session costs several hundred dollars. euros.
Initiated after the start of the Russian invasion, the “Neopalymi” project has been running for a year. Funded by private donations, in partnership with the Ukrainian Ministry of Health, it has already treated some 150 people.
Kateryna Bezverchenko, for her part, has already received a dozen war victims, since she joined the project “with great joy”.
“It’s very important to me, because I’m a medical therapist and I don’t participate in military operations. I felt a very strong need to help our military and to help people affected by war” , explains the specialist.
“I don’t get anything out of it except inner satisfaction and the joy of being able to help people,” she says.
03/08/2023 10:01:42 – Kiev (Ukraine) (AFP) © 2023 AFP
