Medical universities from five countries will develop new technologies for creating anatomical specimens

November 16, Vitebsk / Sergey Kotovets - BELTA /. Joint scientific research and technological support for the educational process in anatomical disciplines of medical universities will become the main areas of cooperation between scientists and specialists of the Vitebsk State Medical University (VSMU) and their colleagues from universities in four countries. This was announced to a BELTA correspondent by Alexander Usovich, Doctor of Medical Sciences, Head of the Department of Human Anatomy at the Vitebsk university. Agreements on scientific and technical cooperation between VSMU and the Nicolae Testemitanu State University of Medicine and Pharmacy (Moldova), the "Astana" State Medical University (Kazakhstan), and Belgorod State University (Russia) were signed following the international scientific and practical conference of heads of anatomical departments and institutes of universities in the CIS and Eastern Europe, held in Vitebsk. In the future, the medical faculty of Trakia University (Bulgaria) also plans to join the cooperation with the Vitebsk university; the draft of the relevant agreement is currently being coordinated. The interaction of scientists is planned to be carried out in several areas, Alexander Usovich noted. First of all, it concerns the development of new and improvement of existing technologies for the production of anatomical teaching aids and specimens, in particular, plastination technology. This is the most promising technology that is actively being introduced in anatomical practice today. Its essence is to replace water in a biological object with a reactive polymer (silicone, epoxy, acetone, etc.), which allows for the production of high-quality anatomical specimens. The international team of scientists already has experience in this area: on the eve of the conference, the first Russian-language textbook on plastination was published in Vitebsk. "Until now, this technology was only mentioned in scientific articles, and we tried to provide the most complete description of it," said Alexander Usovich. In addition, scientists from medical universities will develop unified standards for the legal support of the activities of anatomical departments, including the handling of anatomical material. The complexity of these issues is due to the need to use natural biomaterials in the educational process, working with which, in turn, falls under the competence of various departments, as well as ethical issues, noted Alexander Usovich. Draft regulations will be submitted to the state bodies of the CIS countries for the unification of legislative and subordinate acts regulating all aspects of the functioning of anatomical institutes. The relevance of the issue is also related to solving the problems of mutual recognition of diplomas from universities of different countries, which requires the development of unified approaches to the educational and scientific-methodological aspects of regulating the work of anatomical departments of universities, the interlocutor added. -0-