WONCA E-Update
Friday 26th January 2018

WONCA News – December 2017
Welcome to the latest WONCA E-update. The latest WONCA News (December 2017) was only issued in mid-December, and will remain current until February’s news is published on 3rd February.

News from WONCA’s Young Doctor Movements 
As a new initiative, WONCA’s Young Doctors’ representative on World Executive, Ana Nunes Barata (Portugal), is coordinating regular news from our seven region Young Doctors’ Movements. As Ana reports:

The Young Doctors’ Movements (YDMs) are WONCA’s active network that engages youth and promotes intercultural knowledge exchange, helping to create new ideas, projects and initiatives that contribute for the development of Primary Care at the global level. WONCA’s young doctors are defined as in their first five years of practice as a family doctor OR in training as a family doctor. Each WONCA region has its own YDM that strives to develop its network and engage with the young doctors from every country it represents. The YDM newsletter will be published periodically and it will have the latest news from each YDM. We hope that you enjoy this publication and that you share it in your networks! Together, we will be able to reach out to more young doctors and medical students worldwide! 

Read the full reports from our seven YDM groups via the WONCA website

Montegut Scholarship Awards – Winners’ Reports
The Montegut Global Scholars Program (MGSP) was established by the American Board of Family Medicine Foundation (ABFM-F) in 2010. It was named in honour of Alain Montegut, MD, a member of the Board of Directors of the ABFM from 2005-10 and WONCA North America Region President from 2007–10. Each year MGSP makes an award to one doctor from each of the seven WONCA regions to attend their regional conference.  Below we include reports from two recent winners; both reports make really interesting reading.

Asia Pacific Region Winner: Dr Mya Win Hnit
Dr Mya Win Hnit, of Myanmar, was selected as a Montegut scholarship winner to attend 2017 WONCA Asia Pacific Region Conference, which was recently held on November 1‐4 in Pattaya, Thailand.

South Asia Region Winner: Dr Sanam Shah
Dr Sanam Shah of Pakistan was awarded the Montegut Scholarship for the South Asia region. She is the national secretary, Pakistan for the WONCA Spice Route Young Doctors’ Movement and she reports on her attendance at the recent South Asia Region conference in Nepal.

WONCA is immensely grateful to the American Board of Family Medicine Foundation for its ongoing support to this important bursary programme, which allows doctors from less privileged countries the opportunity to attend major WONCA events. More details of the Montegut Program can be found at: http://www.globalfamilydoctor.com/member/awards/MontegutScholarAward2.aspx

Featured Doctor – Professor Adam Windak
One of WONCA featured doctors for this month is Professor Adam Windak, Conference Scientific Committee chair for the WONCA Europe conference coming to Kraków in May 2018. Adam is a full-time professor and Head of the Department of Family Medicine at Jagiellonian University Medical College, in Kraków, Poland. Jagiellonian University is the oldest and most prestigious University in Poland, so the position of the first Professor in Family Medicine in its over 650 years long history is extraordinarily high profile. Read more about Adam, and about the forthcoming WONCA Europe conference in Krakow, on the website.

WONCA in Bonn: Health and Climate Change 
Climate change is the biggest health threat of the 21st century–and tackling it is perhaps our best opportunity to better global health. How are current medical learners and health professionals interacting with international climate change negotiations? The United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) 23rd Conference of Parties (COP23), took place in Bonn, Germany from the 6th to 17th November. Among the observers was a group from WONCA’s Working Party on the Environment, and you can read their full report on the meeting on the website.

WHO Vacancy – Director, Strategic Planning and Performance Management
WHO has just informed us of a vacancy announcement for the following position, together with the web link where further details can be obtained. Please note that the closing date for applications is 29th January 2018.

Director, Strategic Planning and Performance Management, D-1

  • Location: Geneva, Switzerland
  • Deadline for applications: 29 January 2018
  • Application link (for further details)