Doctor Lisa and Gleb Glinka. Elizaveta Glinka: biography, family, daily feat and work

Elizaveta Glinka: biography, family, daily feat and labor. On December 25, 2016, the lives of 92 people were cut short in Sochi. Among those flying on the Tu-154 military plane to Syria was the famous pediatric resuscitator Elizaveta Glinka. Until recently, Russians did not believe that the favorite of many, Doctor Lisa, had died. They said that she simply could not fly on that plane. And this is partly true. Literally in last days Before departure, she begged the military to take her to Syria. Elizabeth flew there to bring medicine for children with cancer.

After visiting a hospital in Syria, Dr. Lisa for a long time raised funds for sick children there, as well as for numerous sick people in Syrian cities. They were waiting for her as the only hope for life. But they didn’t wait. The plane crashed 2 minutes after takeoff.

Elizaveta Glinka: biography, family, daily feat and work. Elizaveta Glinka was born on February 20, 1962 in the family of a military man and a vitaminologist. Lisa dreamed of becoming a doctor since childhood. In 1986, the girl graduated from the 2nd Pirogov Medical Institute and received the specialty “pediatric anesthesiologist.” When Lisa was studying, she worked part-time at intensive care unit in a Moscow clinic.

However, after graduation, Lisa met her future husband, a successful American lawyer with Russian roots, Gleb Glinka, and emigrated to the United States. In America, Elizabeth began working in a hospice and was amazed at how they treated dying and hopelessly ill people. Having received the second medical education in the USA, Elizaveta Glinka began to dream of opening hospices in her homeland.

And this opportunity soon appeared to her. Her husband was sent on a contract to Kyiv, and Elizabeth followed him. She opened her first hospice in Kyiv. When the husband's contract expired, the family returned to the United States. However, Glinka regularly visited the hospice in Ukraine and participated in its work.

In 2007, Elizabeth’s mother fell ill, and she moved to Moscow with her. There she founded charitable foundation“Fair Aid” and became its director. Elizabeth herself, in addition to managing the foundation, was involved in helping low-income patients. Doctor Lisa was recognized in 2010, when her foundation organized a fundraiser to help those affected by forest fires. In 2014, Doctor Lisa carried sick and wounded children from bullets in the Donbass.

Elizaveta Glinka: biography, family, daily feat and work. Elizaveta Glinka and her husband have three children, one of whom is adopted. The couple's eldest son is an artist.

Doctor Lisa always knew what dangerous work is engaged, but she did it to save the lives of others, those who needed help. She was not afraid of pain and was never indifferent. The death of this woman causes special pain, which is almost impossible to cope with.

It turned out to be a famous doctor-philanthropist who has earned universal recognition among both ordinary people, and among the elites. We are talking about Elizaveta Petrovna Glinka, also known as “Doctor Lisa”.

The topic of the plane crash in Sochi – and the search for those responsible – is now featured in many media outlets. But no less attention in society and among various officials Russian Federation dedicated to this woman doctor, who became a great loss not only for the country, but also for the whole world.

Everlasting memory

In connection with the death of Doctor Lisa, many Russian officials decided to perpetuate the memory of the “symbol of mercy” in many regions of Russia. For example, the mayor of Yekaterinburg, Evgeny Roizman, believes that one of the city’s medical institutions should be named in her honor.

It would be fair to name the hospice in Yekaterinburg after Doctor Lisa. I think all good people, management, doctors and staff will support.

— Evgeniy Roizman (@roizmangbn) December 26, 2016

The reaction to this proposal followed immediately. Judging by reports from the press service of the Yekaterinburg City Duma, it was decided to name the Central City Hospital No. 2 in honor of Elizaveta Glinka.

The head of the Chechen Republic did not ignore the death of Doctor Lisa. The official announced on his Instagram that he had already decided to name the Republican Children's Clinical Hospital in Grozny after Doctor Lisa.

« She devoted her life to the most noble cause - rescuing children from hot spots... Elizaveta Glinka chose the difficult path of supporting those who have nowhere to wait for help", the Chechen leader commented on his decision.

The head of the Presidential Council for Development Assistance also commented on the tragedy civil society and human rights Mikhail Fedotov. In his opinion, Elizaveta Glinka and the memory of her and her deeds should be immortalized.

« She was an absolutely unique person. It was truly an angel of virtue who descended to our earth to do good to people. This was her mission“,” Fedotov was quoted as saying by the radio station “Moscow Speaks.”

All this is only the first reaction of the elites in the Russian Federation to tragic death Doctor Lisa. Why did the death of this woman cause such a strong reaction, taking into account the fact that everyone is calling to perpetuate her memory?

Doctor Lisa's Mercy

You need to understand that Elizaveta Glinka, given her professional skills in medicine, did not choose the best easy way(work in a prestigious medical institution With high salary), and the difficult one is the organization of special medical institutions (hospices), the principles of which she became acquainted with while living in the USA.

After receiving a second medical degree in palliative medicine at Dartmouth Medical School, she took part in the work of the first Moscow hospice. After that, she opened a similar institution in 1999 in Kyiv.

In 2007, Dr. Lisa organized the Fair Aid charity foundation. This organization provided assistance to all cancer patients without exception, including low-income and homeless people. Every year, Dr. Lisa expanded her activities. If you look at the statistics for 2012, on average about 200 people were sent by the foundation to hospitals in Moscow and the Moscow region in 12 months. Elizaveta Glinka even organized special items heating for the homeless.

Dr. Lisa also participated in collecting material assistance for the benefit of victims of various natural Disasters. Her foundation raised money to help people who suffered damage from forest fires in 2010, from the flood in Krymsky in 2012, etc.

Elizaveta Glinka did not ignore the problem of victims of the military conflict in Donbass. Despite criticism from various Western media and international organizations, she completely eliminated any threats and ignored political intrigues, doing charity work for all those in need in the region. While the Red Cross organization refrained from helping the people of Donbass, Elizaveta Glinka worked on supplies humanitarian aid unrecognized republics.

She has done the same in Syria since 2015. Dr. Lisa was involved in the delivery and distribution of medicines, organizing the provision of medical care to the civilian population. By the way, the Tu-154 that crashed near Sochi was just heading to Syria to provide the Tishrin University Hospital in Latakia with all the necessary medicines, which are very important for Syrian cancer patients and newborn children.

30 years family happiness, three children and hundreds of lives saved

Much more will be written and said about Elizaveta Glinka. Everything she did to save people’s lives can only be overestimated or correctly appreciated by those whom she helped. Dr. Lisa always spoke with great enthusiasm and enthusiasm about her activities and the work of the Fair Aid Foundation, but almost never talked about her personal life. Meanwhile, Elizaveta and Gleb Glinka lived together for 30 happy years.

Elizaveta Glinka in her youth.

An exhibition of expressionists was held at the House of Artists in Moscow, where Elizaveta met her future husband, Gleb Glinka. Young Lisa asked a stranger for a lighter, and he asked her for her phone number. The man was much older than her and seemed very old to her. But in response to a request to call, for some reason she agreed. When asked about a date, she said that she had an exam in forensic medicine.

Moscow, mid-1980s.

He met her at the morgue and was shocked by the difference between Russian and American morgues. Gleb Glinka was Russian by birth, but was born and raised in America. Nevertheless, he was always drawn to his historical homeland.

Lawyer Gleb Glinka.

According to Gleb Glebovich, within a week after they met, they both knew that they would definitely get married and live together all their lives. She always liked strong men. Elizaveta Petrovna was attracted not physical strength, but the ability to make decisions and bear responsibility for them. If the man was still smart and educated, then she could well fall in love with him. Gleb Glebovich Glinka studied and brilliantly graduated from college in English literature, and then from law school, with the same excellent grades. Much later, already in Russia at the age of 60, he passed the Russian bar exam and also excelled.

Elizaveta Glinka in her youth.

He was ready to stay in Russia, next to his chosen one, but Lisa just laughed: “You will be lost here!” In 1986 she graduated from the 2nd Moscow State University medical school, received the profession of pediatric resuscitator-anesthesiologist. And until 1990 they lived in Moscow, then they left for America together, along with their eldest son Konstantin.

With Gleb and Lisa in their Vermont home. From left to right: Olga Okudzhava, Antonina Iskander, Lisa, Gleb, poet Naum Korzhavin, playwright and director Sergei Kokovkin, Fazil Iskander, Bulat Okudzhava. 1992

In America, Elizaveta Glinka graduated medical school specializing in palliative medicine. Gleb Glebovich advised her to pay attention to the hospice, which was located not far from their home. Lisa began to help hopeless patients. She spent five years studying how hospices operate and what difficulties they face. And at the same time I understood that it is possible and necessary to alleviate people’s suffering.

First parachute jump, July 2009.

Later they will return to Russia at the request of Elizabeth, spend 2 years in Kyiv due to Gleb’s contract. And everywhere Doctor Lisa will help people. In Moscow, already having two sons, she will work with the First Moscow Hospice, and in Kyiv she will create her first hospice. The most amazing thing is that Gleb Glinka will always support his wife in everything. He, like no one else, understood: helping those in need was as natural a need for her as breathing.

Elizaveta and Gleb Glinka with their son.

When Dr. Lisa’s mother fell into a coma and was in the Burdenko clinic, Elizaveta Glinka bought meat every day, especially mom's favorite, cooked it, ground it into a paste so that it could be fed from a tube. She knew that her mother couldn’t taste cooked food, but nevertheless, for two and a half years, she came to the hospital twice a day and fed her mother, holding her hand. This was all she was.

With husband Gleb and son Alyosha, Vermont, 1991.

Gleb and Elizaveta raised two sons. But a third boy appeared in their family - Ilya. He was adopted in infancy, but when the boy was 13 years old, his adoptive mother died. When Doctor Lisa began to tell her husband about the fate of the boy, he immediately realized: he would become their son. He again supported his wife in her decision.

Gleb Glinka.

He could probably prohibit his wife from engaging in her activities. Elizaveta Glinka herself spoke of her readiness to stop working if it interfered with her family. But Gleb Glebovich believed that he had no moral right to do so.

Gleb and Elizaveta with children.

She loved her family and did not like to talk about them in interviews. She wanted to protect her loved ones from publicity, especially when threats began to be made against her. Dr. Lisa tried to spend weekends with her family under any circumstances. The only time she changed this habit was on December 25, 2016.

Doctor Lisa.

It was difficult for Gleb Glebovich to give gifts to his wife. New thing literally in a couple of weeks you could see it on someone you knew or even on her ward from the Paveletsky station, where Dr. Lisa fed and treated the homeless. And again he did not protest. But she couldn’t help it and was even proud that her charges looked better than other homeless people.
When she first went to the conflict zone in Donbass to save seriously ill children, he realized how dangerous it was. But she again went at the behest of her heart to where she was needed.

Doctor Lisa.

On December 25, 2016, she boarded a plane bound for Syria. Doctor Lisa was carrying medicine for the university hospital. She will never return from this flight.
Gleb Glinka still cannot come to terms with the loss. He refuses to accept the fact that his beloved will never be around again. He will write in the afterword to her book: “I shared my life with her...”

Elizaveta Glinka adopted Ilya Shvets after his mother died of cancer in 2008. A resident of Saratov suffered from cancer and was a patient of the Doctor Lisa Foundation.

ON THIS TOPIC

Ilya's relatives did not even want to pay for his mother's funeral. Then everything fell on Glinka’s fragile shoulders. When the boy flatly refused to go to the shelter, she decided to take him into her family. “So, we went to the guardianship, wrote a statement, and that’s how I got him. The irony of fate: Ilyusha is a mixed race, his father was dark-skinned. I was thinking about what to tell the children: I went to Russia, and also brought a child. I said. The eldest said: “It’s normal, but what?” And the younger one is more emotional: “What are you talking about! Do I really have a black brother now? What's it like in Harlem? How cool, great!” Doctor Lisa said in an interview.

Afterwards it turned out that Ilya was adopted twice. In 1994, he was found right on the street, in a box, not far from a hostel in Ulyanovsk. In the baby’s home, 35-year-old Galina, who herself once grew up in an orphanage, noticed him and decided to adopt him. Nevertheless, the happiness did not last long: soon the family was forced to move to Saratov and was left without a roof over their head.

After long wanderings around shelters and knocking on the thresholds of local officials, Galina and her Foster-son received an apartment, reports Komsomolskaya Pravda in Saratov. However, it turned out that the one-room housing was in terrible condition, so local residents began collecting money for renovations for the family.

But then a new misfortune awaited Ilya - his adoptive mother was diagnosed with advanced stage cancer. As a result, the woman died within two years: neither surgery nor chemotherapy courses helped.

At first, Ilya lived with his foster family in Moscow, but then moved back to Saratov and went to college to become a cook. At first, the young man wanted to quit his studies and return to the capital, but Doctor Lisa dissuaded him. “And then he settled down. Like, his “aunt” in the capital told him: “Don’t even think about it: you’ll move as soon as you get your diploma.” We couldn’t even imagine that this aunt was Elizaveta Glinka...” - they said at the college where he studies young man.

Elizaveta Petrovna Glinka – doctor, specialist in the field palliative medicine, creator and director of the first free Ukrainian hospice, opened on September 5, 2001 in Kyiv. About 15 patients are inpatients there, in addition, the “Care for the Sick at Home” program covers more than 100 more people. In addition to Ukraine, Elizaveta Glinka oversees hospice work in Moscow and Serbia.

In all the photographs, next to the patients, she has a lively smile and shining eyes. How can a person let hundreds of people pass through his heart, bury them - and not become bitter, not become covered with a crust of indifference, and not become infected with the professional cynicism of doctors? But she has had a huge deal on her shoulders for five years now - a free hospice (“you can’t charge money for it!”).

Dr. Lisa, her staff and volunteers have a motto: hospice is a place to live. And a full life, good quality. Even if the clock counts. Here good conditions, tasty food, quality medicines. “Everyone who has visited us says: how good it is here! Like at home! I want to live here!”

Readers of our site have long been familiar with her amazing stories - short sketches from the life of a hospice. It would seem - a few lines plain text, but for some reason the whole worldview changed, everything became different...

Now Elizaveta Petrovna herself really needs help. For several months, Dr. Lisa has been living in Moscow: here in the hospital her mother, Galina Ivanovna, is seriously ill, and has been in the Burdenko neuroreanimation department for several months. She is in a 4th degree coma. With the slightest movement (turning over on her back, for example), her blood pressure rises to critical, which, if diagnosed, could mean the highest risk of death.

But Dr. Lisa was unable to stop being a doctor for these few months: at the hospital she helps many other people: with recommendations on finding funds for treatment, and most importantly, with advice and information about what treatment, according to the law, should be provided free of charge. The management of the clinic asked Elizaveta Petrovna to find another clinic for her mother within a week, despite the fact that Galina Ivanovna’s stay in the hospital would be fully paid for. However, in its current state, transportation is impossible; it would mean death.

Here is an excerpt from Elizaveta Petrovna’s letter to the director of the hospital: “Mom is being observed in the department by the attending physician, who is well aware of the peculiarities of the course of her disease since the second operation. Care is provided by highly qualified nurses on a paid basis, the nurses perfectly perform everything related to the implementation of appointments.

This will prolong her life. Not for long, as I am aware of the lesions and consequences of her disease. In my opinion, transporting such a patient to a new medical institution can significantly worsen the already difficult situation. In addition to the medical aspect, there is an ethical aspect. Mom wanted to be buried in Russia in Moscow.

Personally, as a colleague and as a human being, I ask you to enter into my situation, leaving my mother in the hospital in which she was operated on and is being treated by knowledgeable doctors - those whom I trust.”

Dear readers, we ask for your deepest prayers for a successful resolution of the current situation!

Transcript of the program “Guest”Thomas "" which was recently broadcast on the radio "Radonezh “, prepared by the website “Mercy”.

- Hello, Dear friends. Today we have an amazing guest. This fragile, wonderful woman's name is Elizaveta Glinka. She is a palliative medicine doctor. Hello, Elizaveta!

- Hello!

– We learned about you from LiveJournal, where your name is “Doctor Lisa”. Why?

- Because I never had information platform, and one former patient and close friend of mine suggested that I start a live journal. And since it was a little difficult for me to open it and there was little time, I actually received this magazine as a gift. And “Doctor Lisa” is the so-called nickname that my friend gave me. And since then, I’ve had this magazine for a year and a half - and now everyone calls me “Doctor Lisa.”

– Why did you suddenly decide to connect your life with medicine?

– Because I wanted to be a doctor for as long as I can remember. Even when I was a little girl, I always knew - not that I wanted, but I always knew that I would be a doctor.

– Nevertheless, there are still different directions in medicine. And what you do is perhaps one of the most difficult, if not the most difficult, because working in a hospice, working with patients who may have no chance of later life– this is probably one of the hardest jobs?

– You know, it is always very difficult for me to answer such a question, because when you work in your place, your work does not seem to you the hardest. I love my job very much, and, for example, it seems to me that the hardest work is as a cardiac surgeon or psychiatrist. Or, if we don’t touch on medicine, from sellers who deal with big amount people with different characters.

– Why did you decide to do this? There are many different profiles in medicine - and you came to oncology...

– First I came to intensive care and autophysiology, and then life turned out so that I had to move from Russia to another country, where my husband took me to get acquainted with the hospice - and I saw what it looks like abroad. And, in fact, what I saw completely changed my life. And I set my goal to have the same departments in my country where people can die free and with dignity; I really wanted hospices to become available to all segments of the population. The hospital I did is in Kyiv, Ukraine - and in Moscow I I cooperate with the First Moscow Hospice, which was built fourteen years ago - and now we have been close friends for fourteen years with its founder, chief physician Vera Millionshchikova, quite well known here in medical circles.

The first hospice in Russia was built in the city of St. Petersburg, in the village of Lakhta Leningrad region four years earlier than the first Moscow one. That is, I knew that the beginnings of the hospice movement in Russia already existed, that is, the movement had already begun. And to say that I started from scratch is not true. There were developments - but for example, when we met the employees of the First Moscow Hospice, there was a mobile service and a hospital was just being organized.

And four years later, my life turned out in such a way that I was forced to leave for Ukraine, where my husband got a job under a contract with a foreign company for two years - and thus I ended up in Kyiv. This is where I discovered that, probably, my volunteer activities and the help of the First Moscow Hospice would have to be expanded in the sense that in Ukraine there was no place at all where doomed dying cancer patients were placed. That is, these patients were sent home to die, and if they were very lucky, they were left in multi-bed wards and hospitals in very poor conditions. And don’t forget that this was six years ago, that is, the economic situation was simply terrible after the collapse Soviet Union– and these patients were literally in terrifying situations.

– Due to your profession and due to the characteristics of those people who are your patients, your patients and simply the people you help, you are faced with death every day. In principle, such questions of life and death, when a person first encounters them, as a rule, radically change his outlook on life. There are many such examples that can be given - from life, from literature, from cinema, etc. How does a person who faces such problems every day feel?

- Difficult question. Well, you see, on the one hand, this is my job, which I want to do well. And I probably feel the same thing that any person feels, because, of course, I feel very sorry for the patients who pass away from life, and even more I feel sorry for the patients who pass away in conditions of poverty. It is very painful to look at those patients who have a pronounced so-called pain syndrome - that is, those symptoms that, unfortunately, sometimes accompany the process of dying from cancer. But on the other hand, I must not forget that I am a professional, that this is my job, and I try, when going beyond the hospice, not to endure these experiences, not to bring them, for example, into my family and not to bring it’s in the company of people I communicate with, you know?

Because anyway, due to the circumstances in which I work, many, if I name my place of work and say what I do, expect to see some kind of guilty look, some kind of humiliation in the conversation - do you understand? I want to say that those who work with the dying are the same ordinary people, like us, and I want to add that dying people are also the same as us, they talk a lot about this and write a lot. But it seems to me that no one can hear and understand that the difference between that person who will die soon and me and you, for example, is that there the individual knows that he has very little time left to live - but you and I simply do not we know when and at what minute this will happen. And that's the only difference, you know?

Well, the fact that this happens often before our eyes is a specificity of the profession, I guess I’m just used to it. But this does not mean that my staff - for example, in the hospice - do not cry and do not worry. And in general, people in Ukraine are very emotional - much more emotional than people in Moscow, although I am a Muscovite by birth and by character. But I see that, of course, the staff is worried and crying - but with experience, something like this is developed... not that they become colder, but we just understand... Someone understands that they know something about life another, someone simply understands that they just need to pull themselves together in order to help the next patient. That's how we cope.

– Are there many people who believe that there is something else behind this life?
– I think that out of ten patients, seven will hope for something else beyond, and probably three patients who say - I don’t know if they really think so, but they tell me that there Nothing will happen. Two will strongly doubt, and one will be absolutely sure that there there is nothing, and this earthly life will end - and there that's all, there- empty.

– Do you somehow try to talk to people about these topics?
– Only if the patient himself wants it. Since a hospice is still a secular institution, I must, must respect the interests of the patient. And if this Orthodox Christian, and he wants to talk about it - I’ll bring him a priest, if he’s a Catholic, then he’ll get a priest, if he’s a Jew, then we’ll bring him a rabbi. I’m not a priest, you see, so yes, I will listen and I can tell him what I believe and what I don’t believe.

And there are patients with whom I do not advertise my Orthodoxy and simply level the conversation, because some patients do not accept the Orthodox faith - that is their point of view. In Ukraine there is now a wave of sick people who have joined the Jehovah’s Witnesses sect. And they are really being robbed: just recently a woman died - I wrote about her, Tanya - who, before entering the hospice, where these “brothers” and “sisters” brought her... The first question they asked when they entered: “Where can we sign power of attorney for retirement, who will do this for us?” I say: “Who is this “brother”? Which?" "In Christ!" That is, Tanya was a single woman who was in exile in Magadan for twenty years. And when she returned to Kyiv, they saw this unhappy, sick, lonely woman and “joined” her into the sect... And you know that such patients are weak, very subject to some kind of influence...

And our second conversation was about the fact that they had drawn up a will, according to which Tanya gave them all the real estate. And since this was the desire of this patient... Inside I understand that this is not very nice in relation to this woman, it is unfair, but her desire... She really waited - they came once a day, for five minutes, talking about what they love her, and she said: “Elizaveta Petrovna, my brothers and sisters came to me, look how they love me - they are our God Jehovah!..”. Here. And I couldn’t tell her that “you have the wrong religion,” because she had no one at all. And this is what she clung to two weeks before her death - I have no right to tear off this last attachment of hers in life, so sometimes I just don’t talk about this topic.

– You mentioned that you wrote about this woman, about Tanya. You already said - you are just known as a wonderful author of prose works, short stories - and behind each of them there is human destiny. There is an opinion that a writer is not one who can write, but one who cannot help but write. Why are you writing?

– I absolutely disagree with being called a writer, because a writer is probably the one who received special education or more well read than me. Indeed, I don’t want to show off. In general, the first story... well, not even a story - it’s really my diary. For me - it was a complete surprise when I published it - I had twenty friends there with whom we exchanged: where I was going, what diapers I was buying, something else - that is, purely hospice friends who knew a little bit what was in my life happens...

And then I met one family, the family was Jewish - in my hospice - and they were so different from ours Orthodox image life that I began my short observation - and shared a short story of this family. And the next day, opening the mail, I was completely shocked by the flurry of responses - it was a complete surprise! But, since purely physically I don’t have time to write large diaries, and I’ll even honestly say that I’m not very interested in the opinion of those who read me, I’m interested in what they themselves... I want them to hear, because, as a rule, I have No happy stories with happy endings - that is, I write destinies that touched me in one way or another.

– Were there any responses that you especially remember?
– What surprised me is the number of people who experience this pain every day from the loss of cancer patients – this is the most a large number of there were responses. Again, through the publication of these stories, I probably received about forty-three responses from patients who sought help. That is, this has now become such a platform - for example, now we are literally virtually consulting a woman from Krasnodar region... From Ukhta, from regions of Russia, from Odessa - where hospices are inaccessible - but they read that there is a place where these patients can somehow be helped - and so they write...

I was shocked by the absence, the information vacuum, which concerns the process of dying of patients - that it is possible to alleviate the symptoms, that there are drugs that somehow alleviate them... What surprised me from the responses - many were sure that the services of such a hospice - at the level of services provided at the First Moscow Hospice - paid. And it is very difficult to dissuade them... And, probably, this is my favorite credo, that hospices should be free and accessible to absolutely all segments of the population. I don’t care what kind of patient I have - a deputy, a businessman, a homeless person or a person on parole. And the selection criteria for admission to hospice both in Russia and Ukraine - in addition to those that the City Health Department requires of me - are fatal diseases with a life prognosis of six months or less.

– Please tell me, do you learn anything from your patients?

- Yes. Actually, this is a school of life. I learn from them not every day, but every minute. You can learn patience from almost every patient. They are all different, but there are those who endure what happened to them in life so patiently and with such dignity that I am sometimes very surprised. I am learning wisdom... It seems to me that Shakespeare wrote - I can’t vouch for the literalness of the quote, but approximately the following words: “those who die are stunning with their harmony, because they have the wisdom of life.” And this is really so, literally... You know, they still have little strength to speak, so they, apparently, think through some phrases and sometimes say things that, for how many years I’ve been working, shock me so deeply that yes, I really I learn from them.

And through some patients, I sometimes learn what not to do, because how you live is how you die, and indeed, not all patients are angels. For some reason, many people, reading my live journal, say: “Where do you find such amazing people?” Do you understand? No, they are not amazing - that is, I am saying that there are capricious requests - well, and cold, calculating people. And when I looked at how they passed away, and how the family was destroyed - or, on the contrary, how the family reacted, for myself personally, I probably came to the conclusion that, God willing, I would probably never do in my life. Therefore, we learn good things, we learn from mistakes, because it all happens before our eyes.

I have an amazing priest dying at the moment - the first Orthodox priest who is dying in my ward, today he turned sixty years old, they called him... And I’ll tell you: the thread was carried out in fifteen days, I went into the ward five times to communicate. And from him I probably learned more than from all my patients... And journalists recently came to my hospital and counted - 2,356 patients passed through my hands - and from one I received what in fourteen years of work I had not received from the rest... So I asked - father - what is humility? And he has been a priest for thirty-three years - can you imagine? And hereditary - his father was a priest, and his son is now a priest. He's an amazing, amazing person. And he says: the greatest humility is not to offend those who are weaker than you.
I tell him that this is the most difficult thing in life - not to offend those who are weaker than you, not to shout... And we don’t notice these little things. That is, it could not be some kind of dialogue, but he simply says things that make you think: how did I not understand this, and how did I not know this? This is our father...

– Kudos to you for what you do and thank you very much for taking the time to have this conversation!
- God bless...