Greetings, ladies and gentlemen, dear public, and members of our association. I also extend a warm welcome to all patients suffering from psoriasis.
I would like to express my sincere gratitude to the government of Sweden and the International Federation of Psoriasis Associations (IFPA), who gave us the opportunity to establish a presence on social media platforms. I would also like to thank the General Director of the National Center for Dermatology and Venereology, Mr. Goga Galdava, for his tremendous support, as well as the medical staff working at the center.
Let me briefly tell you about our association. As you know, psoriasis is one of the most common chronic, relapsing autoimmune skin diseases. As patients, we require not only symptomatic treatment but also psychological support. This is precisely why we came up with the idea to establish an association that would help alleviate some of these challenges.
In 2013, we founded the “Association of Patients with Psoriasis.” We developed an action plan and began implementing it:
- We started registering patients.
- We contacted a group of doctors.
- We began seeking financial support.
- We became members of the International Federation of Psoriasis Associations (IFPA).
To ensure the productive work of the association, funding was necessary, which unfortunately we could not obtain in our own country. Recently, IFPA announced a grant competition, in which we naturally participated with our project. Our project was well received by IFPA, which is confirmed by multiple letters they sent us (see website). The Swedish partners provided us with modest financial support to help increase awareness about us in Georgia and to attract the attention of the authorities so they might support us in implementing certain parts of the project. After that, the Swedish side expressed readiness to continue cooperation.
This gave us great strength and motivation, and we began working on project implementation, which included: sending letters to the Prime Minister of Georgia, the Minister of Health, and the Mayor of Tbilisi. Unfortunately, to this day, we have not received any assistance. For example, we lack transportation to reach villages near the occupied territories in order to bring doctors there. Even a request for transportation support was denied. We also received refusals for other types of assistance. For instance, we wanted to rent and equip a space for psycho-rehabilitation, and to establish a 24-hour hotline that would allow patients to receive qualified consultations from the medical center — this too was denied.
Despite many difficulties, we continue to work actively in various directions. With the support of IFPA and the creation of our website through their funding, we are trying to promote our activities and draw the attention of the broader public.
