Authors

Discussion

I would like to explore the informality in Russian healthcare as the reverse side of the generally high level of regulation caused by insecurity of medical activities for patients. Numerous standards and permissions for professionals, providers and facilities are aimed to prevent risks to health and to guarantee quality of services. In Russia the situation is aggravated by the fact that the main source of norms is the bureaucracy due to the weakness of medical professionals' authority. I will investigate and compare two variants of informality associated with the violation of rules. The first case is about the evolution of some methods of CAM towards the informal field due to the changes of regulation in 1990-2010 years. The second case is about the work of the rural health posts (feldsher's stations). Many of them do not meet the contemporary requirements to medical facilities, and feldshers often go beyond the boundaries of their competence in diagnosis and treatment of patients. My consideration is founded on the analysis of normative acts, official statistics and semi-structured interviews with medical workers conducted as part of my research projects in 2013-2021 years.