28.03.2024

In March, one of the largest charity foundations in the country celebrated its 17th anniversary. This charitable organization provides assistance to public medical institutions, including policlinic hospitals, perinatal centers and maternity hospitals. Another important activity of the Foundation for many years is implementation of career guidance projects for teenagers.

Over 17 years of its professional charitable activity, AYALA Foundation has become the only foundation specializing in neonatology and has helped the state fulfill one of the UN Sustainable Development Goals, reducing the infant mortality rate in Kazakhstan by half since 2010.

— With support of our esteemed partners and sponsors, we were able to equip a third of all perinatal centers in Kazakhstan with equipment for saving newborns from disability. More than 1,300 medical devices were transferred to 67 resuscitation and intensive care units all over Kazakhstan for a total amount of 2.3 billion, Aidan Suleimenova, the Founder and President of AYALA Charity Foundation noted.

– We think that our another important achievement is reduction of visual disability rate in premature newborns due to retinopathy to 0.6%, what we were able to achieve together with Assel Ussenbayevna Sharipova and all neonatal ophthalmologists in Kazakhstan in just 2.5 years.

In 2023, the Charity Foundation has raised over 450 million tenge thank to support of our partners, sponsors and donations from hundreds of thousands of Kazakhstani people. This money was allocated for implementation of projects in 3 key areas.

The first area is Career Guidance. Since 2018, AYALA Foundation has been helping SAMSUNG company to implement educational projects in Kazakhstan — SAMSUNG INNOVATION CAMPUS and SOLVE FOR TOMORROW competition. Over 6 years, these projects have reached thousands of teenagers and young people under the age of 25. Only in 2023, more than 200 teenagers received certificates for completing free IT courses on mobile application development and data analytics from SAMSUNG INNOVATION CAMPUS. Many of them build successful careers in Kazakh fintech giants and study at top universities all over the world.

In addition to supporting development of the potential of young IT specialists in Kazakhstan, AYALA Foundation has been working specifically and successfully for several years with the career guidance development of adolescents in two orphanages in Karaganda region. The projects are implemented according to the principles of the world’s best practices of sustainability and effective charity. They are supported by representative offices of two international companies Oriflame and CUMMINS in Kazakhstan.

— Oriflame helped open a career guidance beauty salon for training children with special developmental abilities in the Regional Orphanage. This workshop is open all the time: children are trained in haircutting, styling, makeup and nail-styling,” Aidan Suleimenova says.

– At the same orphanage, CUMMINS Kazakhstan helped equip a cooking room in 2021. The children started from cooking simple dishes with support of volunteers there. In 2023, the company enlarged its initial project and now pupils of the Regional Orphanage for children with special needs attend professional training provided by teachers from Karaganda College of Nutrition and Service twice a week the entire school year.

The same principle is used for providing classes at the sewing workshop of Tan Sholpan, the second orphanage, which was also equipped with the help of CUMMINS Kazakhstan two years ago.

— I think this is an excellent example of effective corporate social responsibility, because knowledge and useful skills will remain with children for life. I am sure that they will become a basis for future profession and financial independence of many children,” the President of AYALA Foundation says.

The second important area of activities of AYALA Foundation is assistance to the state’s work on reducing visual disability in premature children in Kazakhstan.

— In 2023, with support of Chevron, HALYK BANK, Samruk-Kazyna Trust, PTC Holding, Qazaq Oil, Gasenergy, and KAMAZ Engineering we were able to transfer 4 retinal cameras and one laser unit to the perinatal centers of Astana, Pavlodar, Kokshetau and Karaganda as part of I Can See the World project which has been implemented since 2021, Aidan Suleimenova says.

— During 2.5 years of project implementation period, AYALA Foundation transferred 25 units of diagnostic and laser surgical equipment to perinatal and research centers in 14 cities of Kazakhstan. More than 4,500 newborn children were diagnosed there — this is 3.5 times more than in 2021 and 2022! The situation with diagnosing retinopathy in prematurity has impeoved considerably due to increase in the number of diagnosing neonatal ophthalmologists — from 4 in 2021 to 45 at the end of the last year. Many thanks to Assel Ussenbayevna Sharipova for sharing her invaluable knowledge and vast practical experience with the young specialists. We are happy that our equipment and neonatal ophthalmologists helped to save 350 newborns from visual disability — this is 10 times more than in the previous 2 years!

In 2024, AYALA Foundation will transfer 3 more retinal cameras to perinatal centers as part of I Can See the World project. The first one is already successfully used at the Center for Perinatology and Pediatric Cardiac Surgery in Almaty. With the help of Tengizchevroil company, a retinal camera will be transferred to the Regional Perinatal Center of Atyrau Oblast at the end of April. A regional retinopathy center opened there in February, and a modern retinal camera will complete equipping this center with all the equipment necessary for diagnosing newborns. In May, Forus Neo retinal camera will be transferred to the Aktobe Regional Perinatal Center with the support of HALYK BANK.

— When working with public medical institutions, we always coordinate our actions with the Ministry of Health. Over 17 years, we have signed and successfully implemented 3 Memorandums of Cooperation with the Ministry of Health of the Republic of Kazakhstan, including our cooperation in reducing disability in premature infants due to retinopathy. Last year, we also signed a Memorandum of Cooperation with the Public Health Department of the Akimat of Almaty and with the Center for Perinatology and Pediatric Cardiac Surgery. All of them are aimed at reducing disability in children from birth, including provision of assistance to the state in development of fetal surgery in our country, — Aidan Suleimenova notes.

Intrauterine or fetal surgery in Kazakhstan is just making its first steps. Since last year, AYALA Foundation takes an active part in development of this important area of medicine for our country. With support of the Department of Maternal and Child Health of the Ministry of Health of the Republic of Kazakhstan, the Foundation sent 9 doctors from the Center for Perinatology and Pediatric Cardiac Surgery in Almaty and from the National Research Center for Maternity and Childhood in Astana for practical training at the Ural Research Institute of Maternal and Child Health In Ekaterinburg in 2023. For the first time Kazakh doctors completed practical training in fetal surgery on animals under the guidance of Professor Natalya Vladimirovna Kosovtsova.

— We also helped to conduct more than 5 practical seminars on expert ultrasound fetus diagnostics in Astana and Almaty with participation of leading practitioners from the CIS and other countries. We sent two doctors from the Center for Perinatology and Pediatric Cardiac Surgery in Almaty to Spain for the World Congress on Fetal Surgery. For the first time, Kazakhstan took part in this largest forum which gathers the best practitioners from all over the world, the Founder and President of AYALA Foundation emphasized.

In order to reduce disability in children from birth, AYALA Foundation helps the state in developing Fetal Protection Centers based on the basis of the Perinatal Centers. With support of Chevron, the Center for Perinatology and Pediatric Cardiac Surgery in Almaty has started working in a pilot format “One Day Clinic”. In this clinic, for the first time, all pregnant women in Almaty will be able to undergo full screening for the most important pathologies of fetal development in one day at the expense of compulsory medical insurance.

— Chevron helped equip the laboratory with the most accurate microscope and analyzer which are considered a gold standard for prenatal screening in the world. Previously, such diagnostics were available only in private medical centers, it was very expensive and unaffordable for the majority of residents of our country, Aidan Suleimenova says.

According to the assessment of the management of the Center for Perinatology and Pediatric Cardiac Surgery, more than 10 thousand pregnant women will be able to undergo prenatal screening according to European standards in just one day.

— According to our plans for 2024, the goal of reducing infant disability is still our priority. Therefore, we are expanding our work towards early audiological screening for more effective detection of hearing problems in newborns. More than 1,200 children in Kazakhstan are born every year with severe impairment of hearing function or deafness: the frequency of such disorders is observed in 1-2 children per 1,000 newborns. This is 2 times higher than the incidence of Down syndrome and 10 times higher than the incidence of phenylketonuria in newborns, the president of the Foundation notes.

— The currently used method of audiological screening of newborns through otoacoustic emissions (OAE) does not allow identifying hearing pathologies in 100% of children, which leads to disability of 1,200 children annually. Therefore we initiate I Can Hear project in a pilot format which will cover 5 public medical institutions in Almaty. Each of them will receive a device for audiological screening using the short- latency auditory evoked potentials method. It is more accurate and allows doctors to identify if there are problems with the passage of sound waves to the brain. The OAE method cannot identify this problem. We ask all Kazakhstani people and large companies to support us in order to cope with the problem of hearing disability in newborns as quickly as we addressed the problem with retinopathy in premature babies throughout the country.