Research Awareness Campaign

Name of the activity: Research Awareness Campaign

Country/NMO: Greece (HelMSIC)

Program: Teaching Medical Skills

Contact information: [email protected]

Type of the activity: Campaign. Combination of education and advocacy. Campaigns create awareness in society about a certain topic (education aspect) and try to funnel this awareness into pressure on the decision makers to adapt policies accordingly (advocacy aspect).

General description:

Research Awareness Campaign is a social media campaign regarding raising awareness on the importance of Research for Medical Students. The main aims of the Activity are to provide a theoretical background in research methodology for students who are interested in participating in a research program, to share Research Opportunities for them as well as to assess the level of satisfaction of the students with the current Research Education provided by the Universities. These aims were accomplished by promoting related content ,such as articles, infographics and an interactive guide on Research Methodology, on our social media as well as by calling students to take action by filling the form about Research Education and Research in Medicine.

Focus area:

Research basics for medical practitioners

Problem statement:

Greece is one of the few countries where there is no formal education about research neither a way for a student to participate and contribute in a research protocol, but only informal ways to achieve this after a student’s personal search. Consequently medical students don’t realise the importance of research in their study years or in their future carreer and therefore they do not seek further involvement with it and they are unaware of related opportunities that exist for them.

Target groups:

Medical students

Beneficiaries:

Medical Schools

Objectives and indicators of success:

Get Medical Students in contact with Research and Basic Research Methodology

Promote the importance of Research for Medical Students

Promote Research Opportunities for students in Universities and other Institutions

Examine the level of satisfaction of students with the current situation of formal Research Education

Being a Social Media Campaign, the main indicators of success are the website traffic, the number of students that interacted with our posts and promotional material as well as the number of students who filled out the form about Research Education in Medicine.

Methodology:

We aimed to achieve the goals mentioned above by creating promotional material such as infographics, articles and an interactive guide ,based on the topics that we adressed through this campaign, and make them available online on our Social Media Platforms. A GoogleForm was also created requesting feedback from the students on the Research Education that they get for their Universities and their level of satisfaction on that. The campaign was launched in the social media of HelMSIC (facebook page, instagram, website).

Plans for evaluation:

We aim to evaluate the activity by measuring the resonance of the campaign using statistics from our Social Media Platforms as well as examining the answers and the participation of the students in the Google Form. At that time we do not have a pre and post evaluation of the situation.