The tourist's complaint about the lack of accessible facilities in the emergency room prompted criticism of the Ministry of Health of Dagestan.
A tourist with a broken leg complained that she had to climb up and down steep stairs on crutches several times for examination and X-rays at the emergency room in Derbent. Local residents, commenting on her complaint on social media, criticized the conditions for patients with limited mobility and shared similar problems in other medical institutions in Dagestan.
As reported by "Caucasian Knot", on September 11, lawyers called the absence of an elevator in the three-story building of the Makhachkala hospital a violation, where a patient had to be carried down the stairs in the arms. The head of the "Patient Monitoring" project Ziyautdin Uvaisov pointed out that the lack of an elevator could be considered a violation of the law.
In Dagestan, there have been several incidents that caused public outcry when residents had to carry seriously ill patients themselves. For example, on September 7, it became known that a 16-year-old patient at a hospital in Makhachkala had to be carried down the stairs in the arms due to the lack of an elevator. In July, in the village of Tsemir in the Charodinsky district, due to a road destroyed by rains, residents carried a seriously ill villager for almost a kilometer to the doctors. In January 2022, residents of the high-altitude village of Khushet in the Tsunamdin district carried a pregnant woman on a stretcher for more than six kilometers to the highway, where an ambulance crew was waiting for her. After treatment, villagers had to transport the woman back to Khushet through the mountains in a construction cart.
A video of the complaint by the tourist about the lack of conditions for patients with limited mobility in the emergency room in Derbent was published on Instagram*-public tut.dagestan on September 12. In the footage, the tourist stands in the courtyard of the building with two crutches in her hands and shows the path she has to take in the emergency room. The girl explained that she broke her leg. According to her, before getting an X-ray, she first needed to see a doctor. For this, she had to climb a rather steep staircase to the entrance of the building.
After that, the girl needed to walk down a long corridor to the doctor's office. After the appointment, the doctor was supposed to refer her for an X-ray, for which the patient had to go down the stairs to the basement floor. After the X-ray, she had to climb the stairs again without a ramp and return to the doctor.
"Today I came for a follow-up appointment, and when I entered, I was told: why didn’t you register for an appointment? I said: how do I register through the registration? And when I was leaving, the doctor said: now you will register. And I said: where is your registration? He said: it’s not working right now," the tourist recounted.
This video on the Instagram*-public tut.dagestan, which has about 1.6 million followers, had garnered 2408 likes and 217 comments by 10:45 AM MSK on September 13.
Commenters confirmed that patients with injuries at the Derbent emergency room have to navigate stairs and move between floors. "A month ago, we were vacationing in Derbent, and my niece broke her leg. To put on a cast, she had to go through a real quest, as there were no conditions or facilities for this. We had to carry an adult girl in our arms, and knowing that they had no facilities, the doctor did not respond to the request to come down and take a look, showing no humanity. And when we lifted her, he looked from a distance and confirmed that it was a fracture, and for this, we lifted her to the second floor, and then carried her down to the basement. Not to mention that we waited two hours for the ambulance, which was only sent when we had already raised a riot," complained saida_izhakova.
"I was there. It’s really just wild. In our case, it was a wrist fracture, and the child is 10 years old. We went up and down three times: first to the doctor, then for the X-ray, then back to the doctor with the X-ray, then it was incorrectly set – and again for an X-ray. Who thought to place these two offices like this?" asked yadrugaya_000.
"I went with my husband, and it was like this: up and down. And there was also an elderly man in a wheelchair, and those poor souls with injuries helped him. I told everyone about it later too," said paradise_martin_.
Other users pointed out that the problem is not limited to this emergency room. "It’s funny and sinful, as they say, but... This is the reality not only of Derbent but, unfortunately, of all of Dagestan," noted zamiramailru484.
"This attitude is not only towards visitors but also towards locals," wrote schastliva_ya.
As of 10:45 AM MSK on September 13, there were no comments on the website of the Ministry of Health of Dagestan regarding the complaints of local residents about the lack of conditions in medical institutions for patients with limited mobility.
Recall that the Ministry of Health of Dagestan is periodically criticized. For example, on September 2, 2026, residents of the republic, commenting on the department's report on the inspection of women's clinics in Makhachkala, expressed doubts about the data provided and complained about the long wait for appointments with doctors and the need to seek paid medical services. On June 7, 2024, the head of Dagestan criticized the Ministry of Health for insufficient efforts to combat corruption in the ministry and its subordinate organizations. On July 15, 2022, the chairwoman of the Federation Council, Valentina Matviyenko, criticized the department for commissioning inadequately equipped paramedic and obstetric points; later, the Ministry of Health acknowledged the problems with the equipment of FAPs and the shortage of specialists.