Medical management: major lessons learned from the Chernobyl accident (the review)

Abstract

Thirty-five years have passed since the moment of the disaster at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant. It is quite a sufficient period to assess the correctness of the organisation of medical care for victims, to summarise the results of monitoring the health status of various groups of persons involved in the accident, including its direct participants. Radiation from a massive source of relatively uniform gamma radiation and a heterogeneous source of beta radiation can cause affected people to develop acute radiation syndrome (ARS) of varying severity, including non-curable forms of the disease ARS developed in 134 patients; 28 patients from 134 with ARS died in a short time (100 d) after exposure. Among the patients whose disease ended in death, 2/3 of the outcome could be due to radiation skin lesions (19 people). Treatment of ARS varying severity, which was combined with common skin burns with beta radiation, requires long-term specialised treatment. The experience of treating this group of patients has demonstrated that the indications for bone marrow transplantation in the curable form of ARS are limited. The percentage of victims who have absolute indications for allogeneic bone marrow transplantation and in whom this procedure will lead to an improved prognosis for life is very small. Recovery of own myelopoiesis and survival are possible after whole-body irradiation from 6 to 8 Gy, which was found after rejection of haploidentical human leucocyte antigen transplantation, as well as in patients who did not use bone marrow transplantation due to the absence of a corresponding donor. Patients who have undergone ARS need lifelong medical supervision and the provision of necessary medical care.

Keywords: Chernobyl power plant; acute radiation syndrome; bone marrow transplantation; cause of death; late consequences; local radiation injury; radiation accident.