She was screaming for everyone to stop shooting, even though no one was shooting anymore

КА: Katya Alexander

ТГ: Taras Hatsenko

КА: Taras, hello.

ТГ: Hello.

КА: Thank you so much for finding the time to talk.

ТГ: No problem.

КА: I understand how difficult this is for medics, for doctors especially. You had a shift today, right?

ТГ: Every day I work and am on duty.

КА: I hope you're not on duty today.

ТГ: No, no.

КА: Good, excellent. Then I'll try to let you go rest as soon as possible. As far as I know, your hospital has been engaged in saving people inside this entire war for quite a long time, that is, not only the full-scale one that's been going on for a year, but it also treated wounded people before.

ТГ: Since 2014 we've been treating the wounded. To say full-scale, not full-scale, but from 2014, probably until 2017, there were also very many wounded. Now, of course, the volumes are different, much larger, but basically, we've been treating the wounded all the time since 2014, we don't refuse anyone and they bring them to us.

КА: So the experience working with wounds, with battle wounds, most doctors have?

ТГ: Yes, there is work experience, and war taught, let's say, Russia taught us to work with battle wounds. This is completely different from working with civilian ones. I, as a traumatologist, [work] with civilian fractures and closed traumas, this is generally a different approach to treatment. But we have this experience.

КА: You're saying now that it's a different approach to treatment. Can you try to explain to a person, for example like me, I understand little about medicine, try to explain - how does work with battle wounds differ from civilian fractures?

ТГ: Regular civilian fractures are closed or open, but not so infected. Any mine-explosive trauma is knowingly heavily infected, that is, there's a wound, usually large, which is infected with soil, powder gases from these fragments and everything else. A bunch of infections, and they culture out. In the work of a traumatologist in wartime there's no such need to rush with repositioning the fracture, generally to work, let's say, with bones and fix them. The work of a traumatologist in wartime is to primarily stabilize, if it's an infected open fracture, with an external fixation apparatus, and then deal with soft tissues, heal this wound, do skin plasty in order to get rid of infection. Only after this move on to fixing the fracture, the bone, to some kind of internal osteosynthesis. Generally, this stretches over a long time. If a regular fracture heals, let's say, two months, then a gunshot fracture, its treatment drags on to eight, for example.

КА: And you've been working at this hospital for how many years?

ТГ: How long have I been working? I've been working at Mechnikov since my institute days, since my third year I worked there as a nurse, then intern, then doctor. As a doctor for six years, before that another two years as an intern.

КА: So you encountered everything at the beginning of the war, from 2014 you saw everything that...

ТГ: Yes, from 2014 I was an intern and caught everything from the very beginning.

КА: And how was it for you, as an intern, as a person who was beginning his medical career, to begin this entry into the profession through encountering the consequences of Russian aggression?

ТГ: Let's say, thinking about how I'm entering the profession during war would be too selfish. There are much more global questions, and how I'm entering the profession, I think, that's the last thing in this matter.

КА: Alright. And how did you feel, how did you experience this encounter with war, as a doctor?

ТГ: Let's start with the fact that I have my pronounced civic position, both before the war and during it, therefore I entered this with full pride and confidence. Of course, all this is hard, these are all young guys, but we need to do what we're doing, for victory.

КА: Emotionally this is really very hard though. It's impossible to get used to this, on one hand, but on the other hand, I understand that the medical profession implies some detachment.

ТГ: You get used to everything in this life. You get used to everything, and of course, this is harder, probably, than the regular work of a traumatologist doctor in a regular hospital in regular times, maybe in another country. But you get used to everything, work is work. Generally a doctor should be less emotional.

КА: When the full-scale war began, can you try to explain what changed, maybe in volumes, in severity of wounds, that is, what patients began arriving and in what volume?

ТГ: In volume, of course, it changed. Practically for a year I operate 99% only on the wounded, these are civilians and military, the volumes are colossal. I won't give numbers, I'm not sure that's possible...

КА: Yes, I understand.

ТГ: The volumes are large, and this is constant arrivals. The treatment of regular traumas has gone to tenth place, they somehow go more to other hospitals, settle there, because we have continuous arrivals.

КА: So the ambulance tries to separate civilian, peaceful wounds from military ones, so that Mechnikov receives those requiring urgent intervention?

ТГ: You should understand that separating, not separating - that's such a thing, there's just a large number of wounded who are brought to Mechnikov. They also bring them to other hospitals in the city, there's a military hospital, there are hospitals, but they bring the serious ones to us. I think there are city hospitals around the city where civilian wounded can also be delivered. Civilian trauma victims arrive, but not in that volume at all.

КА: In Dnipro until recently such scale incidents specifically in the city, such scale Russian terror, thank God, hadn't happened in such volume...

ТГ: Yes.

КА: Can you try to remember, that weekend, on Saturday January 14th, what was happening, try to remember how events developed for you?

ТГ: Let's say, there had already been not one and not ten missile strikes in Dnipro, there were missile strikes with casualties and fatalities. And before this there were missile strikes with also the most severe consequences: people died, and unfortunately they died in our hospital. But that day I was at home, I wasn't on duty. The explosion thundered, I immediately wrote to the duty doctor asking if they were bringing anyone. Literally 15 minutes later he answered me that yes, and then it appeared in the news that yes, it was into a building. I immediately went to the hospital.

КА: So you volunteered yourself?

ТГ: Well volunteering isn't the right word here, probably. We always... It's not only me like this, very many doctors will always go without any request.

КА: And you went practically immediately in the morning to the hospital? What did you see?

ТГ: This wasn't in the morning. This was around, as far as I remember, three o'clock in the afternoon, the explosion itself.

КА: You arrived at the hospital. What did you see first?

ТГ: Just as I arrived, there was this mass delivery of wounded. Let's say, there wasn't any fuss among the staff, because we're already taught by war, we have a well-coordinated mechanism, we have several resuscitation halls and quite a large group of doctors is always on duty. There are receiving doctors, distributing ones, there are those who provide help. I arrived, there were doctors who also, apparently, had just arrived, but active work was going on. It was such a coordinated anthill, let's say.

КА: Did the number of people brought differ greatly from what you see every day in the hospital?

ТГ: Let's say, simultaneously - of course. They brought about forty people simultaneously, maybe thirty, then they continued bringing more. But it should be said that during the time they were bringing victims from the missile strike on the building, they were also bringing wounded from the zone of military operations. This is a non-stop process, therefore, of course, there were very many simultaneously. It's worth noting the coordinated work, first aid was provided quickly, bleeding was stopped, they immediately took to the operating room those who needed it, those who didn't - immediately transferred to resuscitation in order to free up the resuscitation hall and continue receiving victims.

КА: So you arrived at the hospital, saw this, as you say, coordinated anthill. What did you do next? Can you try to directly remember what was happening, how you worked?

ТГ: I changed clothes and went to the resuscitation hall. I immediately went to the resuscitation hall. From the not serious ones near the dressing room stood on a gurney a wounded grandfather, I immediately took him to the dressing room to treat, treated him and went further to the operating hall. It's worth noting, of course, morally, that these were all non-military people, all peaceful citizens. Of course, it was a bit harder for them to bear this, and basically to look at this. There were very serious ones, there were extremely serious ones. As far as I remember, two people, unfortunately, died already in the hospital. Someone, seemingly one person, died in the ambulance car. There were elderly ones, many elderly people. Therefore we immediately started working, there's nothing even to highlight here. There's a patient, you immediately see the problem - studies, CT, X-ray, and work goes on.

КА: You said that since these are peaceful, civilian people, it was harder for them to bear all this. How did they generally react to all this, what emotional state were people in, including?

ТГ: In a terrible emotional state. It's worth noting that it wasn't summer outside, and most of them were very frozen. There weren't frostbites as such yet among those who arrived initially, they hadn't had time to set in yet, but there was general hypothermia, plus this emotional overexcitement. Of course, people's condition was extremely serious. Plus, relatives kept arriving, asking if there was so-and-so here, if there was so-and-so of such-and-such surname. All this in great stress.

КА: And how did you work in such an atmosphere?

ТГ: Well normally we worked, like every day. Just somehow internal mechanisms switched on even greater concentration.

КА: And what was happening in resuscitation? I understand that you have a large flow of patients and wounded every day, wounded from the frontline, but this probably still somehow differed from conditionally routine military situation.

ТГ: The resuscitation hall - this isn't resuscitation. Resuscitation halls are located right in the emergency department, these are such rooms, they're equipped with everything - artificial lung ventilation, anesthesiologists. In these rooms resuscitation help is provided to those who arrive, and then they go to resuscitation. In the resuscitation halls there were very many people, they're designed for one number, but there were more gurneys. But still they managed, provided help faster. There were many doctors, everyone immediately got involved. Mainly the traumas were extremely serious: fractures, abdominal, and traumatic brain injuries. Everything was accompanied by what's not characteristic for military wounded - everyone was very heavily cut by glass, from feet to head. And these were quite deep wounds that were bleeding, therefore in addition to preventing the main, let's say, wound, it was also necessary to treat these wounds, because they were losing blood from them.

КА: Usually, when it's your duty or in your shift, do you work in these resuscitation halls, or do you work in traumatology somewhere, in another department?

ТГ: I work in the endoprosthetics department. Now, during the war, everything has merged very much, both traumatology and endoprosthetics deal with treating the wounded, traumatologists here and there. I work in the department during the day, but still, when there's some more massive arrival, we immediately go down to the resuscitation hall. Plus on duties, of course, we're on duty there.

КА: And can you, it's difficult, I understand, especially for a doctor to single something out. But maybe you could remember some most difficult case during this Saturday, during the fourteenth. During this terrorist attack what was the most difficult case that went through you?

ТГ: Look, to single out directly the most difficult would probably be wrong. Everyone who arrived from there, in 99% either everyone died, or someone, some family members. Medically the most serious, there were also many extremely serious ones, with damage to the brain, and combined abdominal trauma, and limbs. There was a woman with a huge stone in her thigh, which they saw on X-ray. They stabilized the fracture, after that did an X-ray, and on it glows a huge reinforced concrete structure, let's say, right in the thigh. Many serious ones, and we still continue to treat and are treating some of the victims, that is, their treatment is still continuing.

КА: And you arrived, it turns out, in the middle of the day, even closer to evening...

ТГ: Yes, about forty minutes after the explosion, something like that.

КА: How long did you stand at the operating table, how long non-stop did your work continue after this terrorist attack?

ТГ: I understand that you need to describe this, but it's all not quite like that. We don't have such, I won't say that I stayed very long in the hospital, probably by half past ten I was already home, because I wasn't on duty and we had already received the main mass, there was already the possibility to leave. Every day we stand a lot at the operating table and spend time there on duties, this is practically the whole night you're in the operating room. Of course, something terrible happened, and of course, it was a mass arrival, but to somehow single this out as directly extraordinary shift is impossible. More doctors arrived, more doctors took on the load, work is now so coordinated that everyone knows what to do, and everyone does it clearly. So everyone arrived, everyone did everything. Of course, the duty doctors still finished up, stood with them in the operating room until midnight, but basically provided help in a coordinated way, quite quickly.

КА: I understand that these seem like very obvious questions to you, but I want to show readers how doctors work, including in what conditions. So you say that you stabilized the main mass and the duty doctors remained. How does this process generally proceed? Can you try to describe in words how on this day this flow happened? Maybe this isn't only about this day, this resuscitation hall, how your work proceeds in it?

ТГ: The patient arrives at the emergency department, drives in, ambulance doctors bring him in on a gurney. The patient is immediately numbered, and the preliminary diagnosis is roughly determined. Immediately delivered to the resuscitation hall, where he's connected, if needed, to artificial respiration apparatus. Immediately an anesthesiologist starts working with him, provides pain relief, so that it's possible to work further with the patient. Immediately related specialists come there, examine, the patient goes to the computer tomograph, a computer tomograph is done, and then related specialists already conduct specific treatment. It's determined whether it's necessary to submit to the operating room or they treat wounds right there, apply bandages, if it's not necessary to the operating room, X-ray is done there. If needed, the patient immediately goes from the resuscitation hall with the anesthesiologist to the operating room.

КА: And did many require immediately to resuscitation?

ТГ: Many required immediately to resuscitation. Many required to the operating room, many went. But, considering such a number of simultaneous arrivals, they took only the extremely most serious to the operating room, and those who could be stabilized - they stabilized and transferred to resuscitation. After finishing one operation they immediately brought down those who were scheduled for operation in the second turn.

КА: So you have a worked-out tactic...

ТГ: Of course. We've been working in this for a long time.

КА: This is the consequence of nine almost years of war, this is such reaction and tactic, worked out with military actions, yes?

ТГ: First, this is the consequence of nine years of war. Second, very much thanks to the hospital leadership, which built all this, without administration we wouldn't have built it in principle. We have, now it's called general director, previously was chief doctor, Ryzhenko, and he was able to build a very coordinated mechanism. Plus, we had over this time, there were instructors from NATO, there were instructors from other institutions and countries that are at war. There's a clear algorithm of numbering, clear algorithm of placing patients by green, yellow, red levels of damage, which either need the resuscitation hall, or they remain in booths. Generally this mechanism exists, it's not new, but refined by us, let's say, for our realities. But basically this is already worked out in the world and is considered a protocol situation.

КА: And can you tell about this numbering, I don't know what it's correctly called, how generally patients who arrive, especially during such mass deliveries of people, how does this happen? How are they numbered into these zones: red, green, yellow, how is all this structured?

ТГ: Numbering is separate, they're numbered simply by ordinal numbers. I can't tell you ordinal numbers, because, again, that would be the number of victims. Upon arrival there are duty doctors of the emergency department itself, who evaluate the primary condition of the patient. Then there's an anesthesiologist, who evaluates the patient's condition according to a specific scale: vital functions are disrupted, or there are only limb traumas, or polytrauma, combined trauma. Based on this a specific gradation is set, where the patient will go: either to the resuscitation hall, or directly to the operating room, or to a booth, where specialists will examine him, or to the trauma center, where first aid will be provided.

These are lighter, medium, serious and extremely serious.

КА: And numbering? I'm not asking to say how many people there were, but this is conducted for what? How people are numbered, so as not to lose or... I just don't understand very well...

ТГ: I also don't know. They're numbered for documentary understanding of how many victims arrived to us in general. I don't know if it's worth talking about this at all, that we number people, honestly.

КА: I once wrote an interview with your colleague from another department, and he also told me about numbering, so it seems to me this is some fairly well-known information.

ТГ: Generally, yes. Documents are numbered and this number is drawn with a marker on the patient so that the doctor clearly knows - even if we don't know the surname of the person who arrived, don't know his name, there's a number, so that we could orient ourselves, where this patient is: at the computer tomograph, or in the operating room. We clearly knew where to go, to which patient, it's simpler this way.

КА: Now it became more clear. So you mentioned the woman who had reinforced concrete in her thigh, which was discovered on X-ray. Can you tell a bit more in detail about cases from that terrorist attack, from that day? I understand that it's very difficult to single out someone, but what kind of traumas did people have who went through you?

ТГ: Personally through me, I honestly don't remember already. I provided help to a grandfather, there was a man, he was cut very badly by glass, and one fragment went through the shoulder joint closer to the lung and touched the shoulder vascular plexus, there was direct bleeding. There we worked jointly with vascular surgeons. The patient, in whose thigh was this huge fragment, my colleague dealt with that. I'm just saying that I was present at this, it all goes like this conveyor belt. I remember, there was a little old lady, moreover she didn't have any injuries specifically on her body, but apparently she, as apparently a hospice patient, was lying in one of the apartments, she definitely couldn't walk. They got her out, managed to evacuate her from there. She was already in serious condition, plus these explosions and psychoemotional trauma were imposed on her. It was difficult with her, even just to examine her, because she was in a hysterical state, and considering her general physical condition, it was impossible to even touch her. I remember her, she was screaming, asking for these explosions to end, for them to stop shooting, although no one had been shooting for a long time already. Generally, quite emotionally difficult.

КА: And were there many such patients who had immediate PTSD like this?

ТГ: Yes practically all of them. Everyone was in a terrible psychoemotional state. That is, some people didn't understand what happened, some already understood and saw remains of their relatives, who had just been sitting and drinking tea, and a second later half the body here, half the body there. Of course, everyone had a terrible condition.

КА: And how did this manifest? This little old lady who was in serious condition, she kept asking for explosions to stop. And how did this manifest differently in people? They cried, they asked for help, what was happening to them?

ТГ: I'll tell you, this also isn't the first case, peaceful people come to us, victims from the Bakhmut area, Soledar, before this from other cities where military operations are conducted. And usually it's just an extremely depressed state, the person practically doesn't make contact. You need to talk to him, calm him, try to get at least a word from him, to understand his general condition, even physical. Because if a person will be silent all the time, it's difficult to assess - maybe he has barotrauma, maybe he simply doesn't hear you, he was deafened. I mean, psychoemotionally this is usually such an extremely depressed state, apathetic, well, just apathetic - that's probably easily said, such directly oppressed. Plus they, I'm saying, were all very frozen, that is, they were immediately warmed up, special blankets with hot air supply, warm solutions were introduced, but they were still shaking. They had just been brought from the cold. They had been under these rubble for some time, therefore plus to this condition another condition of this... To the hysterical state, when a person can tremble from some emotional shock, was added that he was very frozen, therefore practically all were shaking, let's say.

КА: And did any of the patients try, I don't know, to tell, convey to you, doctors, from the state of shock, from the first conditionally contact with someone? What they maybe said to you?

ТГ: Yes, you're right. There's a second in people, some completely fall silent, but some on the contrary, want to tell what happened, especially when he has some traumas. When help is provided, then, to stop their pain syndrome, usually we don't talk with them for very long, because anesthesiologists work, and rather sedate the patients. Initially we ask, of course, what happened. It happens they start telling in detail, but when we heard what we need for providing help from this story, then we already start working and the patient won't tell much more, when some medical procedures are being conducted on him.

КА: And what, maybe, from what you managed to hear, what did you remember?

ТГ: Practically everyone said one thing, that they were sitting or lying. This was a day off, and also a holiday. Everyone was at home, and in one second explosion, everything collapses. Someone said they saw dead relatives. It's terrible.

КА: To put it mildly. I understand that you work with this for many years, and this isn't a routine situation, like the whole war. You, first, see people in such a state who suffered from Russian aggression, and also hear how they tell you about how, I don't know, their family was killed before their eyes. How do you cope with this?

ТГ: How do I cope with this personally, morally?

КА: Yes.

ТГ: You know, when they talk about this from the side, ask, it's much more difficult to answer than when you're in this. When I'm in this, it's my work. I feel sorry for everyone, I want to help everyone, but I understand that I have a specific goal at this moment - to save their life. And to give space to some thoughts, experiences at this minute, at this hour I can't. Later, returning home, to family, of course, we can discuss all this, I can express all this. But at the moment when you're in the hospital, providing help, then there's no time for this.

КА: So you completely engage in the work process itself.

ТГ: Of course, yes.

КА: And how did you that day... How did it generally become clear that it was possible to reduce the volume of doctors and medics staying in the hospital and that it was possible to leave everything to the duty doctors?

ТГ: I arrived, and the chief doctor was already there. Well, the medical director and all his deputies, generally everyone was on site. We work, we don't raise our heads much, but people who monitor the work, they see all this. And when they already called from the ambulances, said that that's it, we won't be bringing massively anymore, rubble clearing has begun, there will be individual patients, victims, then they already told us that thank you for the help provided, for the work done, you can be free, we'll manage further ourselves.

КА: So this was around ten in the evening, as far as I understand?

ТГ: Around that, yes. I honestly don't even remember, but yes, around that.

КА: When you already returned home, when this unplanned shift ended for you, connected with the terrorist attack, what state were you in? When there was already such a small distance to this horrible day, how did you experience all this, how did you reflect on all this?

ТГ: To be honest, when all this is happening, what, let's say, doesn't fit in your head in ordinary life, it still seems like it's not happening to you. It still seems like this is impossible in the modern world. Even when you're directly in this, directly you received these patients, you still, when you leave... Let's say, it's always harder to experience everything when you're at a distance. People who left the country, people who are in other cities during this terrorist attack, it seems to me that morally they experience it harder. Of course, they don't experience it morally harder than people whose someone died, acquaintances or relatives, but than just a person, they experience this morally harder. When you're in this and you understand that the next rocket can fly into you, then somehow you relate to all this without sentiments. There's specific anger at the enemy. Rather yes, rather more of this. Sorry for the dead and anger at Russia. There weren't any sentimental experiences in this.

КА: You said at the beginning of our conversation that two or three died in the hospital, still they couldn't be saved.

ТГ: They, you could say, already died in the resuscitation hall, but they already brought them without signs of life.

КА: So practically everyone was saved.

ТГ: Yes, practically everyone was saved.

КА: This is, of course, just some incredible heroism and incredible talent of all the doctors of the hospital. This is after such shelling...

ТГ: I myself am amazed, looking at the view of this building, I myself am amazed how it was generally possible to survive, even in the first seconds after this. There's simply half the building missing, but you see, somehow all this happens.

КА: I understand that you can't, we agreed that you can't talk about numbers, but on this day did significantly more people go through the resuscitation hall than usual, or generally is this somehow more or less...

ТГ: 43 people more.

КА: And you also say that they brought military wounded.

ТГ: Of course, of course. Both military and civilians. Not only military, civilian wounded also very many. The terrorist attack in Dnipro - this is terrible, this is unimaginably terrible, but every day they shell peaceful cities in the east. And they shell with missiles, and just with artillery, grads. They burn out and blow up simply around the perimeter. This isn't one building, it's immediately a block. Moreover they shell, the Russians, specifically peaceful gatherings of people. For example, I don't remember, the day before yesterday I was on duty, they shelled simply a civilian market, an ordinary market. And this is every day - now a station, now a market. We communicate with people who suffered, very often they hit volunteer points, where people gather to receive some provisions, some food package. They know that, for example, at 12 o'clock people will come to receive food, and specifically shoot at this time specifically at this place. Therefore this is a terrible terrorist attack in a city that doesn't directly participate, isn't directly on the frontline, but besides this horror happens every day. If we don't take into account the military, the horrors of this, that young guys, and not young, and adults get traumatized and die, then very many ordinary people die. I recently had a patient also from Bakhmut. They also just went to this volunteer center to receive some food package, I'm saying, it hit them directly in this line. Here to talk about one something, to isolate one terrorist attack from all, is quite difficult.

КА: And can you tell a bit more in detail, from which cities they bring to you and try to tell about these daily shelling of peaceful people near the line, closer to the frontline than Dnipro?

ТГ: They bring to us the entire eastern direction, all those cities that are in the news, from them they bring. Shelling there is conducted not by hours and not once a day, and not twice, but the whole day. I honestly vaguely understand those who still remained there and live, on one hand, didn't evacuate. But on the other hand, usually those who remained are people from the least socially protected layers of society. These are either people with some, українською developmental disabilities, it's wrong to say invalids, with some peculiarities, or elderly, or people not elderly, but who are forced to remain there with an elderly, or with a bedridden, or with developmental peculiarities relative. People have to remain right there, and it's horrible. Their fates, I've communicated with them over a more extended number of years. And there are incredible cases and fates there, were and are. A person, he was hit by these grads, his limb is amputated, but he again still wants to return there, because he says: "Let me go for a day, I locked 4 dogs in the garage, I need to return to open the dogs, because there are no neighbors for 4 streets around." After such you also don't know what even to say. Or there: "Let me back, I have a bedridden mother there, and they evacuated me, picked up wounded on the street."

КА: Oh my God, what people! And maybe you can remember, on the 14th from where else did they bring people, besides Dnipro, from Bakhmut, probably?

ТГ: Yes Bakhmut, Soledar, Vuhledar. There are still many smaller villages there. The entire direction, all this from there they bring. The entire eastern direction, where there are currently the hottest clashes.

КА: And in what condition do they bring people from there?

ТГ: In what condition?

КА: Both physical and moral.

ТГ: In different conditions, mainly they bring serious ones to us both physically and morally. And usually these are, unfortunately, torn off arms, legs of civilians, because a soldier is still protected by some ammunition, unlike a civilian person, therefore... Serious, extremely serious.

КА: Every day.

ТГ: Well yes.

КА: Throughout the entire full-scale war, yes?

ТГ: Of course. Throughout the entire full-scale war people live there. And a missile doesn't ask whether it's flying into a military person or a peaceful home. Or rather, it asks where they'll direct it, but the iron itself won't refuse to fly there. And they direct specifically, unfortunately, they hit entire blocks, whatever still remain. And, unfortunately, again their life in basements... We already see that basements don't save from all this either.

КА: It seems to me this is a very important part of our conversation, that the tragedy in Dnipro - this is absolutely unprecedented and horrible, but this happens every day.

ТГ: This is exactly what I would like to convey, that this day - this is a terrible day, but I can't... You ask me, pose so many questions, and I can't even even in my head somehow single out, let's say. Of course, this is a horrible case, and all this is understandable, these are my fellow citizens from one city, and I had acquaintances in that building. And our doctor from the hospital lost her entire family there, both husband, generally horror, and parents. And she works, and works now, and is on duty. I'm also amazed by her, by her resilience.

КА: Lord, how does she do this...

ТГ: Yes, she only came back from maternity leave, she's a young doctor. I'm saying that every day war goes on, and this case in Dnipro, it alarmed the public, attracted attention, but it's worth not just not forgetting, but constantly knowing that people die in such and in even larger quantities throughout the frontline, and in frontline cities, that war goes on every day.

КА: What I want to promise you, that we'll also put in the headline, that this is very, very important. Even being at a distance, to think about this all the time.

ТГ: Yes, moreover the distance here is small.

КА: Yes, but people are now in different countries and relocation...

ТГ: Yes, I mean that the distance even of neighboring countries is small. Here it's worth understanding that all this is very relative.

КА: Yes, yes, this is true. I constantly want to ask one and the same question, which I ask, how you cope with this, but I understand that you yourself... It's impossible to answer it. ТГ: Well, I'll tell you how I cope with this. So, I'm a doctor. When the full-scale war started on the 24th, I immediately went to get weapons and go fight. My friends, who command some units, military ones, told me that no, you should be there, who will save us? And so I'm a doctor. I, besides being a doctor, before the war I did sports, played rugby. I have a team, now 90 percent of my team is fighting. And they're fighting in the hottest spot at the moment, today. And besides them, another 70 percent of my friends and comrades are at war. And considering their condition, I can't allow myself to say anything about my own, how I cope with this. Much easier than they do.

КА: When you at the very beginning of the full-scale war were thinking about going to fight, did you have some kind of...

ТГ: I wasn't thinking, I went.

КА: Did you have an internal conflict between doctor and soldier? Did you think about whether you would be more useful as a doctor with experience...

ТГ: Look, on the 24th there were about 20 explosions in our city, then there was no thought whether I was a doctor or not. Then there was a clear understanding among everyone that they already... Plus a bunch of internet publications writing that they're entering your region, here they're already entering the city. Then there was only one thought - take weapons and go knock them out of here. Of course, later thinking about all this, naturally, with a cool head you understand where you can bring more benefit. But at that moment, of course, no thoughts. There would be no one to save, there was one thought. To stay and live under Russia - of course not, and internally I'm not inclined to leave either. Better I'll fight for my land.

КА: Thanks to you, very many fighters are recovering and defending Ukraine again.

ТГ: God grant, God grant.

КА: Since you have very many friends serving, especially in hot spots, have you had to treat close ones after the frontline, after wounds?

ТГ: I have.

КА: Is this something you can't talk about, or?

ТГ: I can talk about it, but I don't know if for these people it would be, whether it's even possible, where they were brought from... Well, I have. There were wounds, my comrades personally underwent treatment with me. And also many of my comrades died, that's what I can say. And moreover, very many and moreover since '14.

КА: As with many Ukrainians, unfortunately.

ТГ: Yes, so to talk about my own "how I cope with this"... Much easier than others.

КА: But this is also the frontline.

ТГ: Yes I agree, but to elevate it to some, to hang medals... This is the frontline, we're doing our job. But, for example, those I'm speaking for, they all went as volunteers. None of them was a professional military person, but they were of completely different jobs. This wasn't their job, but they went there at the call of their heart. And I'm doing my job, the one I did before in principle.

КА: Yes, but it changed a lot.

ТГ: It changed, I agree.

КА: To put it mildly, it changed. To treat friends who come, I think, in terrible conditions after the frontline - what is that like? Is it different, or at that moment do you completely turn off the friend and turn on only the professional?

ТГ: I'll honestly say, it doesn't work out completely, but I'd like to come to that. There's still some different attitude anyway. Sometimes you know clearly what needs to be done, but you want to do a little better, but not always will it actually be better and correct from this. In treating the wounded and treating these wounds, stages are important, because all this is accompanied by infection. So trying to do it great and faster isn't always good.

КА: Well, that is, some emotional... still turns on anyway.

ТГ: It turns on.

КА: That's probably good too.

ТГ: I try to get away from this, because this may be good from a moral point of view, but from the point of view of helping a person, it's not always good.

КА: I understand your answer to the question "how do you cope" when your friends, your peers are dying on the frontline. And does anger help you, maybe... That is, what helps?

ТГ: Faith that we will win helps. Every day you wake up with this thought, go, try to save someone. Maybe by evening it fades a bit, but in the morning again you wake up with the same one.

КА: And what helps this faith in the morning again...

ТГ: Healthy sleep.

ТГ: Thank God it exists.

ТГ: Well, not always, but it exists.

КА: With what you see, this...

ТГ: Yes, this doesn't interfere at all.

КА: Yes?

ТГ: Of course, when you work all night, then the whole day, then if you don't fall asleep, you simply won't be able to work afterward. But I don't have such a problem as insomnia from thoughts.

КА: Well, of course, you get so tired too.

ТГ: Any person gets tired now, probably, here.

КА: Taras, first of all, it seems to me that everything you said from beginning to end is very important, and it's very important that we talked about the east. I want to ask you one last question before clarifying all sorts of technical information. Is there something about your work, about the hospital, about the war and full-scale war, about the terrorist attack in Dnipro that you would like to tell me, but I didn't ask you about it?

ТГ: No, it seems I conveyed everything I just wanted to. And your main question is specifically about the terrorist attack, but I... You can't say it like this, somehow it sounds wrong, that it didn't affect me, of course it affected me, but...

КА: It seems to me you said a very correct phrase there, that it's horrible, but such patients are brought every day. And I understand, I'll try to maximally convey your thought that I heard. I understand that you don't want to devalue this tragedy.

ТГ: Of course, people still... We live in this city, I knew very many people from that building. And, of course, it's horrible. And if I didn't know personally, then here everyone knows each other through one handshake, such a city. And, of course, it's horrible, but the scale is much bigger.

КА: Yes, it seems to me this is a very important indicative part of this whole war.

ТГ: Yes, and the fact that they turn off our electricity three times a day for 4 hours, and someone complains about this. It seems to me, this is simply ridiculous.

КА: Am I understanding correctly that the hospital has enough generators so that power outages don't affect it?

ТГ: The hospital works around the clock with electricity. Thank God, everything is set up with this matter.

КА: Yes, that is, power outages in the city don't affect the hospital's work?

ТГ: Yes, there are generators, a whole service works on this. Now the intensive care unit is deployed to unprecedented volumes, and practically everyone is on mechanical ventilation. If you turn off electricity in the hospital, yes, there are batteries in these machines, but at least for 40 minutes, then it will be irreparable.

КА: Yes, without electricity in the hospital there would be a big catastrophe.

ТГ: In the hospital, of course. Around the city now there are complaints that it's hard for people without electricity. It seems to me, this is so wrong and somehow cowardly. In general, all about the same thing.

КА: Yes, I heard your main thought and will try very hard to build your whole monologue around this. Taras, thank you very much for the conversation. It was very pleasant to meet you.

ТГ: Me too.

КА: Strength to you.

ТГ: All the best.

КА: All the best, goodbye.

ТГ: Goodbye.