The Head of the Sakha Republic, Aysen Nikolaev, proposed at the Eastern Economic Forum 2024 to scale up the region's experience in organising accessible medical care for remote Arctic settlements. In Yakutia, mobile medical teams have been operating since 2023. By the end of last year, doctors had visited all the Arctic districts of the republic, assisting 33,000 citizens. Among them were 11,800 children and 14,000 representatives of indigenous small-numbered peoples. The project involved six multidisciplinary teams and one specialised paediatric team. A total of 294 medical staff participated in the expeditions, of which 254 were doctors. In total, the doctors made 49 trips to 80 populated areas.

The teams typically include a therapist, neurologist, cardiologist, surgeon, ophthalmologist, gastroenterologist and ultrasound specialist. There is also a demand for narcologists and dentists; additional specialists can be included in the team depending on the needs of the local population. Doctors fly to patients on Mi-8 helicopters and An-24 aircraft, covering thousands of kilometres to reach remote areas through bad weather, cold and other 'delights' of the Far North. Sometimes all-terrain vehicles come into play. Last year, doctors covered 103,000 km by air and 17,700 km by land.

Mobile medical teams address the need for regular examinations of patients who are not yet ready for hospitalisation but require careful treatment under the supervision of specialists. Currently, in most remote Arctic settlements, medical assistance is provided through feldsher-midwife points (FMP) and outpatient medical offices. Despite regular updates to their material resources, they face a shortage of specialised professionals. Getting to the regional centre is time-consuming and expensive, which is not always accessible for local residents. Doctor visits in the field help address the issue of personal patient examinations, while regular monitoring of individuals' health is conducted through telemedicine.

Additionally, in Yakutia, population screenings are conducted using mobile centres built on the basis of KAMAZ trucks. They are all-terrain medical offices equipped with furniture, medical equipment and a supply of medicines. The team of specialists travels along winter roads, checking the health of the population, providing vaccinations and offering useful advice. In 2024, surgeons also took to the skies in the Sakha Republic. Twelve highly qualified specialists set out on a journey through the Arctic districts to perform scheduled surgeries for local residents. Surgeries are performed in district hospitals of municipal centres, and local doctors conducted examinations of their patients to identify those in greatest need of assistance. The teams included trauma surgeons, gynaecologists, orthopaedic surgeons, coloproctologists, cardiologists, maxillofacial surgeons, anaesthetists and theatre nurses—specific specialists are dispatched based on patient requests. The stars of medicine also conduct educational courses and masterclasses to enhance the qualifications of local medical staff. According to Aysen Nikolaev, last year, thanks to the mobile medical teams, hundreds of lives were saved.

This is not the first initiative that, after being tested in Yakutia, is preparing for scaling up. Thus, at the EEF, an agreement was signed to extend the Yakut system of connecting remote settlements to the Internet via fibre optic lines to Chukotka, and the experience of building small-scale nuclear power plants in the Yakut tundra will soon become the property of the entire country. It is expected that the small nuclear power plant in the Ust-Yansky district will supply electricity to the gold mining companies of the Kychus gold deposit, the Kular gold-bearing area, the Ruchey Tirekhtyakh tin deposit and the Deputatskoye lead-zinc deposit. New trade and logistics centres are also being built in the Republic of Sakha, which are expected to reform the delivery and distribution system for goods in the Arctic, alongside other significant projects.  

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