Congratulations to the new Candidates of Medical Sciences!

 – The title of my research work is “Clinical efficiency of sympathetic radiofrequency denervation of renal arteries in patients with resistant arterial hypertension”. We applied interventional method of treatment of malignant hypertension. Despite of the taking of three and more medications, some patients still had high blood pressure, and we had to perform radiofrequency denervation of renal arteries to eliminate the reason of additional blood pressure raise. This method helps to decrease blood pressure. The procedure does not require installation of the constant implant, it is efficient and safe and is included into the national recommendations of AH treatment. We have a register of hypertension patients and we selected 40 people aged 27-70 years old. Then we performed operations in Tyumen Cardiology Research Center and compared them with 40 patients without operation. Analysis showed that this method positively influenced the patients’ condition, blood pressure lowered, we even cancelled some medications in several patients.

I have watched the work of Lyudmila Gapon (L.I.Gapon is MD, PhD, Professor, Head of Clinical Cardiology Department, Scientific Supervisor of the Department of Arterial Hypertension and Coronary Insufficiency of Tyumen Cardiology Research Center, Tomsk National Research Medical Centre, Honored Scientist of the Russian Federation), she invited me to the Center, she started to teach me how to write articles, thesis, she inspired me! Here, in the Center, the entire team is working on the scientific issues, you are collecting scientific data not on your own. It is a huge advantage of the Center. You can always apply to the mentors for advice. Nina Saveleva, MD, PhD, Cardiologist of the highest category, Senior Scientific Researcher of the Department of Arterial Hypertension, was my mentor as well, I gained a lot of knowledge from her.

Writing and defending of PhD thesis is a self-development for me. I have read a lot, learnt new recommendations, researches, you visit different conferences, gain new experience in the field of your study. It helps to do your clinical work because you give more help to the patients.

I have gone through 10 years of work to get this title, it is a big chapter of my life! It is like to give a birth to a child (Note: Ekaterina has two children). Now I am waiting for the certificate and together with my mentors we will discuss the plans for the future work. Of course I would like to defend thesis for the doctor’s degree. We are going to continue our study – since September we are going to invite patients with resistance hypertension for the control examinations. We will study the long-term effect of renal arteries denervation, write articles and be more efficient in treating our patients.

 – The title of my PhD thesis is “Predictors of left atrial appendage thrombosis in patients with non-valvular atrial fibrillation”. Since 2018 we have been working on this study. When we revealed predictors of LAA thrombosis, we created mathematical model to calculate the thrombotic risk. My husband, an IT specialist, helped me; he designed the formula, transferred it into computer program. Now we only need to input the patients data and the program calculates the thrombotic risk automatically.

I have always wanted to do science, especially when I worked at the Department of arrythmology under the guidance of Natalia Khorkova. My first research supervisor was Alexander Rychkov, Professor, Research Supervisor of the Department of Heart Rhythm Disturbances of Scientific Department of Instrumental Research Methods. They taught me a lot and promoted love to science. It was his idea to create such database. Then I worked with Tatiana Gizatulina (Note: MD, PhD, Head of Scientific Department of Heart Rhythm Disturbances, Senior Scientific Researcher, Professor of Scientific & Methodological division). Writing the work fell on my decree, so all my relatives, parents, husband helped with the child while I was doing science. We study new scientific directions, improve our knowledge, learn all the most advanced and can put it into practice, helping people.

Science is fun! I can confidently say that all the reviewers read my Ph.D. thesis, their significant comments and questions were very helpful. It's too early to talk about a doctorate. I will continue to work as a researcher, further study my topic, write articles. I think it is not necessary to have a scientific work to be considered a good doctor, because not everyone wants to do science. But I myself now feel great satisfaction from the work done!

We wish Alfira and Ekaterina further success, new scientific achievements and discoveries.