10.02.2021

Units for therapeutic hypothermia and electroencephalography were donated to the Perinatal Centre of Semey. The equipment was purchased thanks to the donation from Daniyar Rustemovich Abulgazin. The Foundation is convinced that this medical equipment will help reduce neonatal mortality caused by severe forms of hypoxia.

The perinatal Centre has been operating in Semey for 82 years. It is designed for 190 beds, including 12 in the neonatal intensive care unit. Every year, it treats from 450 to 600 newborns with various pathologies of the perinatal period. About 35% are premature babies. This perinatal Centre serves both the urban population and villages located at a distance of 200 to 600 km from Semey. Dozens of newborns from this region will be cared for annually using the hypothermia hardware complex donated by the AYALA Foundation.

The hypothermia unit does a very delicate and vital job. It accurately, with a very precise dosage of the temperature level, cools the entire body of the newborn or parts of it. Precise temperature exposure allow to adjust blood flow and control restoration of cells or affected areas of the infants’ brain.

It is very important to use therapeutic hypothermia in the very first hours and even minutes of a newborn’s life. Then there is a chance to restore functioning of brain cells. If such a unit is not available in the hospital, the child will most likely be left with severe functional damage to the central nervous system, and in the worst case, may die

To date, therapeutic hypothermia is considered as the main world-recognized physical (non-drug) method of protecting the brain of newborns during hypoxic-ischemic injuries.

In 2020, more than 20 newborns were saved using hypothermia equipment installed by the AYALA Foundation in Almaty, Atyrau and Turkestan.

“Since 2007, our Foundation has been working with the main goal of reducing infant and child mortality in Kazakhstan. For this purpose we are collecting donations to install the state-of-the-art medical equipment in children’s intensive care units throughout Kazakhstan. For 14 years of work, thanks to the support of major sponsors, as well as with the participation of Kazakhstanis in crowdfunding, the Foundation managed to save hundreds of thousands of children’s lives in our country. Since 2017, our Foundation has been actively involved in the search for sponsors to equip perinatal Centres with hypothermia equipment. For 4 years, with the support of major sponsors, we installed such hardware systems at the National Research Centre for Maternity and Childhood in Nur-Sultan, at the Centre for Perinatology and Pediatric Cardiac Surgery in Almaty, and at the Regional Perinatal Centres of Atyrau and Turkestan, Perinatal Centre of Semey. Every child’s life saved is a great common victory. I am sure that our new equipment will help with this,” said Aidan Suleimenova, president of the AYALA Charity Foundation.

Transfer of the equipment took place as part of the republican Let’s Breathe Life project. Over 14 years, this project has covered 36 cities and 67 medical institutions in Kazakhstan. Hundreds of Kazakhstani neonatologists and nurses have completed skills improvement training courses. Over the entire period of implementation of the project, for 642.3 million tenge, transferred by major sponsors and Kazakhstanis, the Foundation bought and supplied in hospitals: 96 phototherapy units, 11 ventilators, 7 neonatal intensive care incubators, 18 resuscitation side tables, 25 bedside patient monitors, 2 anesthesia units, 4 EEG monitors, 6 therapeutic hypothermia units.