Introduction

WHO designates International Centre for Family Medicine and Primary Health Care as a WHO Collaborating Centre.

(18-10-2010)

The World Health Organization designates the Primafamed Ghent University Centre of the Department of Family Medicine and Primary Health Care (Ghent University) as a WHO Collaborating Centre on Primary Health Care.

This news was announced on October the 16th 2010, at the occasion of the celebration of the thirtieth anniversary of the department, during the international symposium "Primary Care at a crossroads?".

The World Health Organization, the European region, has, after consultation with the Belgian authority, decided to designate the International Centre for Primary Health Care and Family Medicine of the Department of Family Medicine and Primary Health Care (Ghent University) as a WHO Collaborating Centre on Primary Health Care.

The designation lasts for a period of 4 years and can be renewed.

Prof. Jan De Maeseneer will be the head of the centre. There are in the world only 16 WHO Collaborating Centres on Primary Health Care.

This designation illustrates the appreciation for the expertise and the commitment of the department, both regionally and mondially, reporting the development of primary health care at the level of education, research and service delivery.

The international activities of the department are actually coordinated by the Primafamed Ghent University Centre, an international centre for family medicine and primary health care. Within this centre, the Primafamed-network has been developed, a platform of more than 20 institutions in Africa that are developing the training of family physicians and other primary health care providers.

Apart from the International Centre for Reproductive Health (ICRH) of the Faculty of Medicine and Health Sciences and the Laboratorium for Parasitology of the Faculty of Veterinary Medicine, Ghent University receives a third recognition by the World Health Organisation.

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In 2008 the rector of Ghent University, Prof. Paul Van Cauwenberge, has approved the development of an "International Centre for Primary Health Care and Family Medicine - Ghent University" named "Primafamed-Ghent University". The Centre is situated within the Department of Family Medicine and Primary Health Care of the Faculty of Medicine and Health Sciences of Ghent University. The establishment of this centre was a logical step in the process of developing activities in the field of primary health care in over 20 countries in 4 continents, that started in 1997 from the Department of Family Medicine and Primary Health Care.

The mission of Primafamed-Ghent University is to contribute worldwide to improvement of health status of populations and communities through development and strengthening of primary health care and family medicine as a strategy to achieve equitable care.

Primafamed - Ghent University wants to contribute to the following objectives:

to develop research in primary health care and family medicine in a broader international context;
to strengthen primary health care as a first contact of a population or a community with the health system and to develop family medicine as a clinical discipline operating in the primary health care team;
to strengthen education and training, both at undergraduate and postgraduate level, and, continuous professional development;
to make expertise on primary health care and family medicine available internationally for universities, institutes for higher education, NGOs, governments and international organisations.