Health Festival – Hellenic Medical Students’ Congress on Public Health
Health Festival is a congress on public health designed by medical students for medical students in Greece. The main topics considered change each year and focus on major Public Health Issues such as: Non – Communicable Diseases, Mental Health, Antimicrobial Resistance, Communicable Diseases etc.
The congress is under the auspices of the National School of Public Health, the National Organisation of Public Health (EODY), and the National Medical Society.
The program consists of two stages:
The first stage of the congress includes interactive speeches from healthcare professionals, workshops that focus on evidence based medicine and educational trainings from external parteners of HelMSIC and Peer Education Trainers of HelMSIC.
The second stage consists of a street action, taking place in a central place of the city, where the participants have the opportunity to inform the general public and perform open-to-everyone check-ups.
The main targets of the project are:
- To educate and sensitize medical students on Public Health Issues
- To sensitize Medical Students about the access to health
- To educate medical students on practicing medicine according to public health standards
- To promote collaboration between medical students
- To put emphasis on the importance of prevention
- To inform the general public about major public health issues
The 1st Hellenic Medical Students’ Congress on Public Health – Health Festival 2018 is focused on Diabetes Mellitus and Cardiovascular Diseases and the importance of prevention.
In December 2020, the 2nd Hellenic Medical Students’ Congress on Public Health – Health Festival was held online, because of the COVID-19 Pandemic. More than 500 students were able to attend an educational, informative and interactive program.
The main focus areas were the Communicable Diseases, and specifically the Infections, including SARS-CoV-2, Vaccinations and the Antimicrobial Resistance. Despite the circumstances, the congress still managed to maintain its basic structure, since it included speeches, parallel sessions, workshops and forums. Inevitably, the second stage could not take place, but a campaign was launched instead as a follow up, aiming to educate medical students on how to inform the public properly about public health issues.
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