She raised funds for the preservation of Russian cultural heritage, fostering of new talent, and treatment programs for children's blood cancer.

She was the eldest of three children of Maxim Andreyevich Titarenko, a railway engineer from Chernihiv in Ukraine, and his Siberian wife, Alexandra Petrovna Porada, from Veseloyarsk.

[3] The events of the Soviet Coup of 1991, which attempted to depose her husband from power, left a lasting scar on Gorbacheva, who suffered a minor stroke on the final day.

This and further donations raised by both of the Gorbachevs helped to buy equipment for blood banks and to train Russian doctors abroad.

She received treatment for two months under the supervision of Professor Thomas Büchner, a leading haematologist, but died on 20 September aged 67.

[8] In 2007, the Raisa Gorbacheva Institute of Pediatric Hematology and Transplantology opened at the First Pavlov State Medical University of St.