1st International Summer School: Applications of ICT in Biomedicine Dubrovnik, August 5th-10th 2002

Brief report by Marc Nyssen

Combining work with pleasure, learning and leisure would best summarise the one-week summer school, held in Dubrovnik on the Croatian Dalmatian Riviera.

Imagine a small, interested group, five days of lectures and discussions, a selection of excursions and group dinners, all providing a forum for informal chat and meeting with colleagues, students and teachers in the appropriate environment of the Dubrovnik International School, a stones throw from the Adriatic Sea. But although relaxing and sightseeing were an integral part of the event, there were more serious matters at hand: lectures, discussions and even on-line tests formed the base of the weeks activities.

Organisers Ratko Magjarevic and Ron Summers had set up a well-balanced program consisting of technical, managerial and vision topics in the field of ICT in Biomedicine:

Digital Libraries by Ron Summers
XML by Marc Nyssen
E-Health Records by Ratko Magjarevic
Health Cards by Vedran Batos
Semantic Web by Ron Summers
Informatics System Management by Paolo Inchingolo
m-Health by Vedran Bilas
Decision Support by Hartmud Dickhaus

These half-day lectures, given by teachers who are among the leaders in the field were well documented and illustrated with real life ICT examples in biomedicine. Students were presented with printed copies of all the lectures and at the end of the course, a CD-ROM compilation, comprising all lectures and supplementary documentation was given to each of the participants.

During the final "fellow" sessions, the participating students gave a brief presentation of their own work in progress, their background and current PhD work.

The lectures were planned on Monday, Tuesday, Thursday and Friday, leaving Wednesday for a superb boat excursion to the nearby Elafite Islands and Saturday morning for the fellow presentations.

Evening meals on Monday and Thursday were in fact small excursions to exquisite places along the Dubrovnik Riviera: we visited Cavtat and Mali Ston, in the early evenings, before sampling delicious seafood for dinner.

Both students and teachers from all over the world, took advantage of this unique opportunity to learn from each other and to establish this indescribable atmosphere of international friendship.

Thanks to the great personal involvement of organisers Magjarevic and Summers and thanks to the sponsors who are:

The Croatian Ministry of Science and Technology, the Faculty of Electrical Engineering and Computing, University of Zagreb, British Council Croatia, S&T Group, Hypo Alpe-Adria Bank, IBM - Croatia, Jamnica, Croatia Airlines and the IEEE EMB Society.

This Summer School can be considered a great success and one that I hope can be repeated.

Sincerely hoping to see you on the next Summer School in Dubrovnik!

Lecturers and students of the ICTSS '02 in front of the International Centre of Croatian Universities, Dubrovnik

In the classroom: during the lectures of profs. R. Summers and V. Bilas

During the Welcome Reception