AMSE 2025 conference report – AMSE Newsletter – 2025 – No. 7
Dear friends and colleagues, dear members of AMSE,
The Faculty of Medicine of Palacky University in Olomouc, Czech Republic hosted the annual conference of the Association of Medical Schools in Europe (AMSE) 16 – 18 October 2025. The main theme was:
The Backbone of Academic Medicine:
Strengthening the Ties Between Universities and Teaching Hospitals in Europe
I would like to take this opportunity to look back on the AMSE 2025 conference, which featured excellent presentations by domestic and foreign educators, scientists and students. This is for those who could not attend as well as for those who did.
Topics discussed during the three-day professional event in Olomouc included the development of medical faculty curricula in light of the increasing emphasis on training practical clinical skills, the use of new technologies in teaching and the ethical conduct of doctors, as well as the strengthening of ties between medical faculties, universities and teaching hospitals.
“The meeting not only served to reflect on current trends in medical education, but also enabled new collaborations to be establish of that will likely contribute to the improvement of teaching and the prestige of medical education in Europe in the future,” said Milan Raška, Vice-Dean for International Relations and General Medicine at the Faculty of Medicine and Dentistry Olomouc, on behalf of the organizing committee.
The conference was attended by over180 participants, primarily from the European Union, but also from Georgia, India, Australia, the UK and the USA. Presentations were given by, for example, Ronald Harden (UK), founder of the Objective Structured Clinical Examination, Jakub Tolar (USA), who focused on the AI in contemporary medical education, Madalena Patricio (Portugal), who focused on the importance of ethics in medical education, Nomy Dickman (Israel), who dealt with the position of doctors as educators and the implementation of active learning in the clinical environment, Olle ten Cate (Netherlands) who focused on Entrustment Principles in Health Care Education, and Janusz Janczukowicz (Poland, President Elect AMEE) who focused on the health workforce in rural and remote areas.
“There were also presentations by the winners of the Denis O’Leary Award 2025, which is presented by the Oxford Centre of Medical Education in recognition of excellence in medical/clinical education with an emphasis on the patient. The awardees were Despoina Mantziari from Aristotle University of Thessaloniki in Greece, who presented the “Partners of Experience in Cancer (PECan)” project and Dr. Emma Flint from Warneford Hospital, Oxford NHS Foundation Trust in the UK, who presented the “360-Degree Psychiatry Experience” project.
Students and future physicians also had the floor. The student section focused on improving learning through support from older students, and featured presentations of professional papers. “I am very grateful for this opportunity. It is also an interesting experience, because lecturing in English on a professional topic is something that we don’t often have the opportunity to try in class,” said Michal Kropáček, a member of the AMSE 2025 Conference scientific committee and 5th year student of General Medicine and chairman of the Medical Association of the Faculty of Medicine and Dentistry Olomouc.
The prestigious Peter Dieter Leadership Award was presented to Prof. Vladimír Palička, a professor of internal medicine and former student of the Faculty of Medicine at Palacký University Olomouc and later the dean of the Faculty of Medicine at Charles University in Hradec Králové, both in the Czech Republic. He served also the director of the University Hospital in Hradec Králové. “I am deeply honoured to receive this award, but to be honest, I am not sure if I deserve it. My only hope is that I did not receive it just for my long service on the AMSE executive committee,” he noted in his acceptance speech, reflecting on the education of medical professionals today. ‘Our mission is to teach our students how to think, how to apply knowledge and information, how to work with data, how to act wisely and how to uphold values such as ethics, empathy and humanity. Above all, we must ensure that they never forget to ask ‘why?'” said the award-winning Professor Palička.
The representatives of Palacky University and AMSE would like to thank all those who actively participated in organising and conducting the AMSE 2025 conference, as well as thanking all participants for attending.
From Berlin,
Harm Peters