OREANDA-NEWS. August 10, 2012. A meeting of Deputy Minister Olga Koposhilova with Vesa Korpelainen, executive director of the North Carelia Center for Public Health (Finland) took place in the Ministry of Health and Social Development of the Republic of Karelia. Matters concerned work on the Health in Focus project application within the Karelia cross-border cooperation program for 2007-2013.

Discussion of the project application

Tiina Vlasoff, coordinator of cross-border programs and projects of North Carelia Center for Public Health, Professor Kerttu Tossavainen, University of Eastern Finland, Kirsi Bykachev, the Health in Focus project coordinator, and Professor Tiina Laatikainen, unit director of the National Institute for Health and Welfare, represented the Finnish delegation.

Andrei Mikhailov, Head of the Medical Relief Department of the Ministry of Health and Social Development of the RK, Olga Bilko, chief medical officer of the Municipal Polyclinic N4, Mikhail Nezvitsky, the Karjalan Sanomat newspaper editor-in-chief, Nikolai Oskin, director of the resource center of public prganizations of Karelia, took part in the conversation on the part of Russia.

Full title of the project to span the period of 2013-2014 is Health in Focus: Improvement of Prophylaxis and Healthy Lifestyles Promotion in Two Karelias.

Within the scope of the project on the basis on the Health Center of the Municipal Polyclinic N4 of Petrozavodsk it is supposed to study the level of health of fourty-year old men considering themselves healthy for disease development risk identification and consulting them about their health preservation. The unemployed will be examined in Finland. disregard the fact that there will be two different target groups in two countries, the main goal of the project is common – improvement in population health on both sides of the border.

 The project events are aimed to improve the community awareness of the health risk factors (in cooperation of mass media and experts in prevention of diseases), increase of attention of citizens to their level of health, as well as the level of knowledge of health professionals and journalists regarding issues of formation of healthy lifestyle. It is expected the new knowledge and methods gained through the Health in Focus project implementation will make it possible to increase the efficiency of preventive work.