Doctors diagnosed progressive scoliosis. They say an operation is urgently needed. Because of his ribs’ deformation, Artem has grave problems with his lung and heart.
Photo: Aleksandr Krjazhev
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A Boy Who Has Never Run
// Artem, 5, needs an operation on his backbone
Artem Yusupov’s backbone is curved in an arc. It is an extra-difficult case of scoliosis. The child’s ribs are crooked, and one lung and the heart are squeezed. Artem is thin and weak, he gets tired very quickly. This little boy from Novosibirsk can be rescued in his native city, in the local Research Institute of Traumatology and Orthopedics. The operation is yet unique in Russia, and it must be paid. Endo-correctors VEPTR will be installed on Artem’s ribs and pelvis. They will grow in size as the boy grows up preventing scoliosis from developing. Unless the boy is operated now, prognosis is bad.
You can do nothing about it: some children are born healthy, and others have a bunch of grave diseases. Professor with Novosibirsk’s Research Institute of Traumatology and Orthopedics Mikhail Mikhailovsky calls them multiple inborn anomalies.
When Artem grew up in his mother’s abdomen, his vertebrae began joining the wrong way due to some absurd error. After he was born, doctors spotted a defect – hip displacement. By the time he was two, the leg was put the right way, but the ribs and vertebrae continued developing wrongly. The boy now has a hump, and he can’t run. Can you imagine a boy who has never run?
Preparing for our meeting, Artem puts on jeans, a new striped T-shirt, and declares to his mother Lena that he won’t tell me anything; then he places his favorite cavy Sonya on a chair at the door. While I take off my shoes, the boy, leaning against the wardrobe, studies me figuring out whether he should make friends with me or not.
“Jeans are festive clothes with us,” Lena says. “Most often, we buy toys and jeans. And Artem goes to work in jeans, you know.”
“To work?” I ask in surprise.
“Well, he puts on his jeans, takes some papers, and sets off to an office. Just like his father does.”
There are seven members in their family, with Artem and his father Ravil being the only men. The grandmother struggles to cope with her grandson and granddaughter, who has just started going to school. Because of his disease, Artem can’t go to kindergarten; Lena left her job to stay with her son.
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The Russian Aid Fund was founded in 1996 to assistant the authors of desperate letters sent to Kommersant. We verify the letters with the help of local authorities, then publish the letters in Kommersant, Domovoi magazine and on the site www.rusfond.ru. If you decide to help, you will receive the banking details of the authors of the letters, and the rest is up to you. You just help you help. This approach has been popular with our readers. More than $8.4 million has been collected. We also organize relief efforts during national catastrophes, for 53 families of the miners who died in the Zyryanovskaya Mine in Kuzbass, 57 families of the policemen who burned to death in Samara, 153 families of the victims of explosions in Moscow and Volgodonsk, 118 families of the sailors who died on the submarine Kursk, 52 families of the hostages who died in the seizure of the performance of Nord Ost, 39 families of those who died in the Moscow Metro on February 6, 2004, 100 families who suffered losses in Beslan. The Fund is the winner of the Silver Archer award.
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The father works much, and Artem wants to help him.
Lena invites me to the children’s room, and Artem doesn’t mind it. Perhaps he just wants to look polite. He brings his cavy Sonya in and places it on a blue sofa. Artem walks swaying. A big head, thin arms, and a hump under his striped T-shirt.
“Don’t you think Sonya may fall?” I ask Artem.
“She is smart, she is not afraid of height,” he replies hiding his face in his mother’s shoulder.
He learnt to walk only at three. With his hip displacement, Artem spent three weeks in a stretcher – his legs were tied to a special apparatus. Then the boy was treated with plastering. All in all, he spent eight months in plaster. When the displacement was cured, and Artem was taught to walk, another disease was found: his left shoulder-blade began bulging out. The Yusupovs turned to Novosibirsk’s Research Institute of Traumatology and Orthopedics, where “malignant progressive scoliosis at the fourth stage” was diagnosed. Professor Mikhailovsky said the Yusupovs had no choice: an operation was needed. At that time Artem’s parents thought the operation was too risky, and during the following two years they tried to cure their son with swimming, massage and manual therapy. Nothing helped. One day Lena saw a TV program about people who were cured with VEPTR apparatuses, which were made in Novosibirsk by German surgeon Rüdiger Kraupse, with Professor Mikhailovsky assisting him.
“They showed a boy, who couldn’t stand before the operation, walking,” Lena remembers. “And I finally made up my mind.”
During the second examination Professor Mikhailovsky said scoliosis progressed very quickly, and an operation was urgently needed.
“Let’s play,” I tell Artem. There is a plastic farm in the corner, with cows, hens and pigs.
“I play with palents and fliends only,” Artem buries his head in his mother’s shoulder again.
When Artem talks, he looks down. I try to imagine how five-year-old boys play if they can’t run, and I fail.
OK, we won’t play. Let’s have some tea instead. Artem sways from side to side. Perhaps it is easier for him to keep the balance this way. To step over a threshold, he has to cling to the door.
When drinking tea, he takes a sheet of paper instead of sweets.
“He doesn’t like sweets,” Lena says.
Artem paints sea with a violet marker.
“We were at the seaside last year,” Lena remembers. “Artem, what color was the sea?”
“Salty,” Artem answers rightfully. “There were a lot of bees, and one of them even bit me here,” he points to his wrist with his tiny fist.
“Did you cry?” I ask him.
“Vely clied,” Artem looks down. “And when I had my bilthday, Luntik-the-bumblebee came to me, flom the caltoon. He has a big head and soft paws.”
Lena takes Artem in her arms. We talk in a low voice, and the boy falls asleep. He’s had a hard day.
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1,083,000 rubles needed to rescue Artem Yusupov!
Professor with Novosibirsk’s Research Institute of Traumatology and Orthopedics Mikhail Mikhailovsky:
“Artem has a very difficult case of progressive scoliosis. His backbone’s deformation is now 90 degrees. The child is disfigured. He has grave problems with his lung because of his ribs’ deformation. He can’t breathe properly.”
In Novosibirsk there is now the unique VEPTR system, which was paid by our readers. Professor Mikhailovsky knows pretty well how to use it. He trained in Germany, and in April Professors Rüdiger Kraupse and Mikhail Mikhailovsky performed two operations using the endo-correctors, which is new in Russia. Their patients were Arseny Tiunov and Vladik Zadigullin. Last Tuesday Professor Mikhailovsky operated Dasha Surovyatkina. The three have the same disease as Artem has - the anomaly of the backbone development. The three operations were paid by our readers. According to Professor Mikhailovsky, those were successful operations. He considers Artem Yusupov will have to undergo a series of operations, and they must start “immediately, because the boy will die without treatment”.
The operation and the endo-correctors cost 1.5 million rubles. The parents didn’t manage to collect such a big sum. As usual, our permanent partner Ingosstrakh will donate 417,000 rubles. So, another 1,083,000 rubles is missing.
Dear friends, you can transfer your donations to the Sberbank account of Artem’s mother Elena Yusupova, or to Novosibirsk’s Research Institute of Traumatology and Orthopedics. You can find all details with the fund. It is also possible to pay with credit cards or web-money via the e-payment system (find more information at www.rusfond.ru). We appreciate every ruble you may donate.
Russian Aid Fund experts
Olga Korshakova
All the Article in Russian as of Sep. 29, 2008
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