Sverdlovsk Oblast to Merge Hospitals for Specialists
Consolidating district hospitals with Yekaterinburg clinics aims to provide remote residents access to medical specialists.
The Ministry of Health of Sverdlovsk Oblast plans to merge hospitals in Ivdel, Pelym, Makhnyovo, and Alapayevsk with large medical institutions in Yekaterinburg. These measures, as stated by the region«s Health Minister Tatyana Savinova on OTV, are designed to solve the staffing crisis and improve the accessibility of medical care.
«Throughout 2025, we studied where we have the biggest problems, primarily staffing ones. In some places, we understand that the most correct path for us is the unification of medical institutions. We have one of the most difficult staffing situations in Ivdel and Pelym, this is the far north of the oblast, they cover a large territory, there is low population density. We have difficulties even with managerial personnel, not to mention specialist doctors, they are essentially not there,» said Tatyana Savinova.
To improve access to care, starting from February, the population of the northern territories of the oblast will be served under the supervision of Sverdlovsk Oblast Clinical Hospital No. 1. Doctors from this hospital will begin traveling to Ivdel and Pelym on a shift basis. The person responsible for the quality of medical care there has been appointed as the chief physician of the oblast hospital, Igor Trofimov. The official annexation of these hospitals to the oblast hospital is planned for May.
Primary care will still be provided by local paramedics and district doctors. Specialists will start coming to Ivdel and Pelym once or twice a month. Their work schedule will be formed by mid-February. According to Tatyana Savinova, medical teams have already been informed about the upcoming changes and received the news with enthusiasm.
«Inpatient care will be carried out according to our routing. Some patients will be treated in Krasnoturinsk, some in Severouralsk, and some of the most complex cases, of course, in the oblast hospital,» explained the minister.
A second organizational decision was also announced: the Ministry of Health will merge the district hospitals in Makhnyovo and Alapayevsk with the Central City Clinical Hospital No. 3 of Yekaterinburg. On its basis, Oblast Clinical Hospital No. 3 will be created.
«Today, Central City Hospital No. 3 is headed by one of our most anti-crisis medical managers, Anton Starkov. I am convinced that he will spend part of his working time in Yekaterinburg, and the other part in his new structural subdivisions. And I very much hope that we will solve both staffing and financial issues, and, most importantly, improve the quality of medical care in these three medical organizations,» said Tatyana Savinova.
