SThe first edition of the Welcome day dedicated to medical area residents of the University of Foggia took place this morning in the Turtur Room of the Policlinico Riuniti.
The initiative, promoted by the rectoral delegate for health policies, Gaetano Serviddioin collaboration with the Rectorate and the Faculty of Medicine, saw the participation of the President of the Puglia Region, Michele Emilianoof the vice-president of the Puglia Region and budget councilor, Raffaele Piemontese, of the mayor of Foggia, Maria Aida Episcopoof the bishop Foggia – Bovino, Giorgio Ferretti and the general director of the Policlinico Riuniti of Foggia, Giuseppe Pasqualone.
Speaking for the University of Foggia were the rector, Lorenzo Lo Muzio, the director of the Department of Medical and Surgical Sciences, Gaetano Serviddio, the dean of the Faculty of Medicine Giuseppe Carrieri, the director of the Department of Clinical and Experimental Medicine, Maurizio Margaglione and the directors of the Unifg Specialization Schools.
“Our University is a place not only of education, but a place of life and growth for our students. This welcome day, dedicated to new students enrolled in the medical area specialization schools, represents not only an opportunity to welcome them from the academic community, the city and the territory but also to illustrate the different aspects of the specialization path, the opportunities and services offered by our University – said Lo Muzio -. This event aims to ideally mark a fundamental step in the careers of our young doctors, the beginning of a training path that will lead them from graduates in Medicine and Surgery to become specialized doctors. A path that will see the support of an institutional synergy on multiple levels and which we are certain will be characterized by active participation, commitment, love for the profession and respect for the patient”.
“Today’s signature represents our desire to provide concrete support the growth of new doctors, to offer them the possibility of developing themselves in Puglia or coming to study and work here from other regions, of bringing healthcare as a whole to ever greater levels of excellence – declared Emiliano -. For the Puglia Region, financing specialization schools and scholarships in addition to ministerial ones means investing in young doctors and their aspirations, because human capital is our most precious resource. We have made many strides in healthcare in recent years, when I became president Puglia was last for essential levels of assistance, today we are among the virtuous Italian regions. We are alongside the University to strengthen these training courses, also through scholarships, to improve further”.
This year, approximately 130 doctors have registered at the 37 medical specialization schools of the University of Foggia. A significant fact that testifies to the attractiveness of the training offer which, in addition to being diversified, is characterized by innovative teaching that aims at the acquisition of professional skills in a broad training network; the Unifg model also aims to offer concrete opportunities to doctors who want to undertake a university career by offering research projects in the context of clinical studies and collaborations in the drafting of publications, posters and abstracts; Furthermore, the University is investing in advanced medical simulation technologies, multimedia systems and audio systems for excellent medical simulation and for the exercise of diagnostic practices capable of making the simulations realistic. Added to all this are personalized administrative services, numerous international mobility programs at excellent facilities which offer the opportunity to enrich specialist training through periods of study abroad and extracurricular activities which allow trainees to enjoy a training and learning experience. rich and stimulating personal growth in a community of 500 doctors in specialist training.
“The first Welcome day for medical residents at the University of Foggia is a celebration for the whole city. As President Michele Emiliano said, in recent years the Puglia Region has made investments in high medical training and research that should be done by the State and which the State does not make. Since 2018, we have focused on the medical specialization schools of the University of Foggia 35 and a half million euros, with which we have achieved the result of having 37 active specialization schools today: the same number as in Bari. It is an investment to satisfy the strong demand for doctors that the healthcare system manifests throughout Italy, it is an investment in young people who study and it is an investment in a city that strengthens its ambition to become a university city, attracting people who can choose to live , study and work in Foggia”. He declared Piedmontese.
“The University of Foggia has invested heavily in medical training: in three years we have tripled the places in Medicine and Surgery and increased those for nurses to more than 500. We train almost all healthcare professions, we have courses in 5 locations, not just in Puglia. In 10 years we have activated 31 specialization schools only thanks to two substantial and impressive investments from the Region, without whose contribution we would be at a standstill today. But that’s not enough: the shortage of doctors on the national territory, which adds to the shortage of highly specialized healthcare professionals, requires a new model of organizing advanced training. The risk is a further and irreversible impoverishment of medical skills precisely in the southern regions which, if in some way have stemmed the passive mobility of patients, have not made a dent in the hemorrhage of young people and talents. The occasion of this first edition of the welcome day is propitious for bringing together university offerings and regional demand for health and assistance, with the aim of designing new models of cooperation and development together”. Servidio added.
Great enthusiasm was expressed by the medical specialists who participated in large numbers in the first edition of the Welcome Day which ended with the testimony of Nicoletta Maldera, resident doctor at the School of Specialization in Geriatrics who declared: “I started studying medicine at the University of Foggia when FB was born in America. Since then, many things have changed, our University has come a long way, and I too have had the opportunity to compare and contrast different realities, living and learning to appreciate lives different from mine. Nonetheless, when I found myself choosing the specialty and the imprint I wanted to give to my training I had no doubts. Foggia and geriatrics, which is the internal medicine of the elderly, were once again my choice. Being a student in 2024 means facing different challenges from the past, often perhaps not even fully understood given the rapid changes that have taken place. For this reason, knowing that you are understood and guided in this path, knowing that you can count on a rich and varied and on teachers who listen and who manage to adapt the path, as far as possible, to our needs, diminishes that sense of “obstacle course” and confusion that we have all felt at least once. Because we must not forget that becoming women and men of science, specialists dedicated to research and the improvement of our common knowledge, must not make us lose sight of the primary role of caring for the suffering of our patients and of mutual help and support between us colleagues ”. The event concluded with the presentation of a Unifg sweatshirt to President Emiliano and all the residents.
