November 7 was the International Day of Medical Physicists. Consequently, TalTech celebrated several anniversaries related to health technologies: the Department of Health Technologies and the Estonian Society for Biomedical Engineering and Medical Physics (EMBÜ) celebrated their 30th anniversary this year. Also worth celebrating is the 15th birthday of the e-health study programme and the fact that medical engineering and physics education has been offered at TalTech for 27 years.
To celebrate the major events, an exciting conference was held on November 7 at the Tallinn TV Tower, where representatives of the Department, Society, study programmes and partners talked about their achievements and future plans. There were nearly 100 former and current partners and people related to TalTech's health technologies at the Conference.
The regaining of independence gave impetus to the development of the field
In the early nineties of the last century, specialists in biomedical engineering and medical physics were very much needed in hospitals, and someone had to prepare them. The Department of Health Technologies began with the presentation of TalTech professor Hiie Hinrikus to the Rector, justifying the need for biomedical engineering in Estonia and its perspective, which resulted in the establishment of a biomedical engineering center in 1994 by the Rector's directive.
In 1993, studies in biomedical engineering were started as part of the radio engineering study programme. A year later, a biomedical engineering center was already opened at the university. Over the years, education in the field of health technologies has been offered at TalTech in various forms, and today, education in the field is requested in a focused manner through e-health and medical engineering and physics master's programmes.
Technology becomes increasingly important in medicine
"Healthcare is becoming more and more technology-oriented, and smart technologies help to make the healthcare system more accessible, more personalized and more accurate. Health is not merely the absence of disease, but human health consists of components of physiological, mental and social health. In this way, the innovative health technologies of the future, through which we want to improve health and health care, must take into account the wider context when born, not from the center of a single organ, but considering a complete system at the level of the organism, the environment and the evolutionary path. Therefore, it is very logical that we are looking for and need more and more cooperation between the Departments's groups, with other faculties and with universities, the public sector and companies both at home and abroad," said Jana Holmar, director of the TalTech Department of Health Technologies.
Photos of the conference „Department of Health Technologies and EBMÜ 30“