For a long time, the Soviet legacy shaped Ukrainians’ understanding of rehabilitation as a trip to a sanatorium with mineral water and mud baths. Modern challenges and a large number of complex injuries are forcing the healthcare system to abandon the concept of passive recovery in favor of evidence-based medicine. Today, the medical community and patient organizations are working to distinguish between the concepts of rest and functional recovery of a person after severe conditions.
The Philosophical Gap between Sanatorium and Medicine
For a long time, sanatorium-resort treatment was perceived as the main stage of recovery. Enterprises issued vouchers, and people went to Truskavets or Morshin, considering it a medical necessity. In fact, physical rehabilitation has completely different goals and methods. Real recovery begins in the acute period, right in the hospital room, and not months after discharge. The main difference lies in the activity of the patient themselves.
Anastasia Boichuk, the head of the war trauma rehabilitation initiative for the “Patients of Ukraine” organization, emphasizes the fallacy of the old approach
“Depending on what we call rehabilitation. If it’s classical sanatoriums where they give vouchers ‘get healthy, drink water, go for massages’ – then this system should become a thing of the past. In a sanatorium, a person remains a passive consumer of services, whereas in a modern rehabilitation department, they work every day to return lost skills”.
The Fight for Quality and Imitation of Change
The financial component of the process is also undergoing transformations. The National Health Service of Ukraine puts forward clear requirements for institutions that want to provide rehabilitation services. However, the old system is trying to adapt to new conditions only formally. Sanatoriums often masquerade as rehabilitation centers to receive budget funds without changing their approach to treatment.
“We see cases where institutions simply purchase equipment but do not have specialists. Quality rehabilitation is impossible without a multidisciplinary team: doctors of physical and rehabilitation medicine, physical therapists, ergotherapists, psychologists, and speech therapists. If an institution only has a massage therapist, it will not ensure recovery after a stroke or a complex mine-explosive injury,” the expert notes.
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Return to Everyday Independence
Ergotherapy is becoming one of the most important elements of the modern model. This direction deals with the return of a person to everyday life. The task of a specialist is to teach the patient to dress again, use tableware or hygiene products. This is critically important for people with a high level of amputation or paralysis. The state is beginning to understand that investing in quality functional recovery is economically beneficial, rather than lifelong maintenance of a person on social benefits without the possibility of employment.
The Trap of Excessive Family Care
The role of the patient’s environment in this process is often underestimated or misinterpreted. Relatives often try to make life as easy as possible for a person with a disability, doing all the little things for them. Such excessive care harms the recovery process.
Anastasia Boichuk warns relatives against over-care
“It’s very important not to do everything for the person at home. We often see how specialists work actively in the department, the person returns home, and there relatives try to serve them and help with everything. It’s necessary to stimulate movement in all possible ways. It’s better to organize the space so that the person reaches for objects and does it themselves”.
Social Integration as the Ultimate Goal
Socialization remains the final goal of any medical intervention. Ukraine is gradually moving away from the medical paradigm of disability, where a person is perceived solely as an object of treatment. The new approach is based on providing opportunities for work and participation in community life. The arrangement of workplaces for people with disabilities allows veterans and civilian patients to be integrated into the full economic cycle.
“As a state, we need to see people with disabilities not as objects of care, but as active members of society. Interaction with society is extremely necessary for mental health and final recovery,” the guest of the “120 Beats per Minute” podcast summarizes
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