WITH ALL OUR STRENGTH – MENTAL AND PHYSICAL – WE FIGHT AGAINST CANCER

In the fall of 2024, Viktor Nikolaevich Sklyarov, a highly esteemed track and field coach with more than 40 years of experience – whose athletes represented the USSR national team and repeatedly won national and international championships – received a devastating diagnosis: stage 3 stomach cancer. He was immediately informed that it was impossible to receive treatment in Sloviansk, Donetsk region, due to a lack of resources and specialists.

His daughter, living in Russia, was determined to save her father and find skilled doctors. Local authorities quickly helped the family obtain Russian documents, but integrating the patient into the oncology care system required additional time and effort. Time, however, was something they did not have – the situation was critical, and his strength was visibly fading. That’s when specialists from P. Hertsen Moscow Oncology Research Institute – branch of the Federal State Budgetary Institution of the “National Medical Research Radiological Centre” of the Ministry of Health of the Russian Federation, stepped in.

“First and foremost, it was necessary to address the complications caused by the disease, particularly severe anemia, as any oncological efforts would have been futile without it,” explains Olga Shitikova, the head of the General Oncology and Chemotherapy Department. “We managed to provide rehabilitation and supportive therapy in a very short period of time and then proceeded with chemotherapy itself. We installed a port system and began treatment. Our patient tolerated the chemotherapy course well and without complications.”

“Relatives and friends in different cities prayed for my father, as did his students from various years, coaching colleagues, friends, and acquaintances,” shares Viktor Nikolaevich’s daughter. “Before his hospitalization at the P. Hertsen MORI, we managed to attend a Sunday service at the Novospassky Monastery, venerate the miraculous icon and ask for the intercession and help. With a lighter heart, we entrusted my father to the care of the doctors.”

Thanks to the expertise of the institute’s specialists, the fervent prayers of his family, and the patient’s own faith in the success of his treatment, the first two courses of chemotherapy showed positive results. Viktor Nikolaevich gained weight and his hemoglobin levels improved. This was a significant victory on this “short-distance” stage of his battle. Further drug therapy lies ahead, but most importantly, his overall condition has clearly taken a turn for the better.

“I’ve already mapped out a little rehabilitation program for myself,” Viktor Nikolaevich said with a conspiratorial wink as he bid us farewell. “Nothing too intense, of course, just gradually easing into physical exercise. I’ve got the experience for it – now I just need the health!”

As we watched him walk away, comparing his stride to what it was a month ago, we thought: just like doctors, coaches never truly stop being who they are.