Abstract
BACKGROUND
Since the outbreak of the Russian Federation invasion, the border city of Kharkiv has come under bombardments leading to disruptions of the medical supply chain. Mission Kharkiv (MK) is a non-governmental organization (NGO) created in 2022 by Ukrainian volunteers to organize a consistent supply of chronic medications, especially anticancer drugs, in the area of Kharkiv.
METHODS
A partnership was created between MK and MSF in June 2022. MSF decided a donation of 12 anticancer drugs, all registered on the World Health Organization list of essential medicines. The supplies were dispensed to MK by MSF teams in Ukraine. MK was in charge of the storage and the distribution of the drugs to patients meeting eligibility criteria determined with Ukrainian oncologists. Digital database was created to allow traceability of every medication from its donation to its dispensation.
RESULTS
From October 2022 to April 2023, platinum compounds, taxanes, fluorouracil, trastuzumab, doxorubicin and hormone therapies were given to MK. Drugs were stocked in a warehouse unit equipped with cold chain facilities. 749 patients met eligibility criteria and were registered on the database to receive a whole course of treatment prescribed by Ukrainian oncologists. >99% of patients were ECOG 0-2. The largest types of cancers were digestive cancers (200 patients with gastrointestinal cancer, 21 with pancreatic cancer and 2 with biliary tract cancer representing 29.7% of all patients), breast cancers (206 women – 27.5%), gynaecologic cancers (151 women – 20.2%) followed by lung cancers (49 patients – 6.5%), hematologic malignancies (44 patients – 5.7%) and head and neck cancers (44 patients – 5.4%). Disease stage was reported in 723 patients. 32% were diagnosed with stage I-II, 33% with stage III and 35% with stage IV. Included patients received an average of 4.5 cycles of chemotherapy.
CONCLUSIONS
This model of humanitarian cancer medication release, coupled with cooperation between NGOs and a high level of digital traceability, has proven to be efficient. This approach could be scaled up in the future, enabling more cancer patients suffering from the consequences of war to benefit from this humanitarian program.
