According to the data from Poland’s National Health Fund, about 1.2 million people suffer from depression in Poland. Approximately 30% of them are unresponsive to conventional treatment. The first medication program for “Treatment of patients with treatment-resistant depression” in psychiatry was launched several months ago. It involves treatment with esketamine, a drug which will be refunded. The recommended treatment cycle duration is 7 to 8 months and the success rate ranges around 40%. We talk to professor Agata Szulc, head of the Department of Psychiatry at WUM Medical University of Warsaw.

4.92 is the highest grade average accomplished at the WUM Faculty of Medicine for the last 10 years. This is the final grade of Wiktoria Grycuk. This year, there were 26 women and 10 men among the top graduates. And ladies only in the top 10.

Urinary tract infections (UTIs) are among the most common bacterial infections in humans, mainly caused by uropathogenic Escherichia coli (UPEC). Around 30% of patients, notwithstanding adequate antibiotic therapy, experience recurrent infections (RUTI) caused by the same UPEC strain as in the case of the original infection. The reason of this chronic character of URIs is a small fraction of transitionally not growing UPEC cells called persister cells, yet the mechanisms leading to URI recurrence remain unknown – writes Marcin Równicki, PhD from the Microbiota Lab.

Contemporary universities no longer focus on professional training only. What is becoming equally important is to give students growth opportunities, to teach them critical thinking and problem solving. We talk to Piotr Dziechciarz, PhD hab., leader of the Education Quality Workgroup at the University, about the contemporary teaching goals and methods and the challenges and limitations that follow.

Targeted therapy with alpha particle emitters is a chance for patients with recurrent gliomas. Further development of this innovative treatment method depends, among others, on quantitative molecular imaging and assessment of the absorbed radiation dose. This will probably allow us to individualize the proposed therapy even more — writes Eng. Monika Tulik, Ph.D. medical physicist from the Department of Nuclear Medicine at the Medical University of Warsaw.

In the near future, the recruitment of patients for a new scientific project will begin at the Medical University of Warsaw, the aim of which will be to compare three different methods of inducing liver parenchyma hypertrophy. The study will be carried out by a team of researchers from the 2nd Department of Clinical Radiology, the Department of Nuclear Medicine and the Department of General, Transplantation and Liver Surgery at the University Clinical Center of the Medical University of Warsaw. We hope that the results obtained will allow us to answer the question: which of the tested methods is the most effective and safest for patients - writes Karolina Grąt, MD, PhD, the main researcher of the project.

It is commonly believed that a doctor who orders a lot of tests is a good specialist. They are committed and they care about the patient’s health. One that refuses to refer a patient for examination is suspicious. Hence, to avoid being suspected of bad faith, to prevent grievances from patients or complaints from families, doctors undertake defensive medical decision-making. What it means in practice and what consequences it has - prof. Tomasz Pasierski from the Department of Medical Ethics and Palliative Medicine at WUM.

The Children's Emergency Department is visited by patients after accidents on an electric scooter, cross bike, skateboard, and even after a bow shot or parachute accident. There are also more and more children who fall victim to "challenges" on social media. We talk about typical and unusual holiday injuries and the specifics of the work of a paramedic with Jakub Zachaj from the Medical Rescue Department WNoZ WUM.

A new career path is now opening for pharmacists, meaning professional pharmaceutical care of patients. - It comprises pharmacist advice, medication reviews, building an individual pharmaceutical care plan, selected diagnostic tests for evaluation of treatment and analysis of drug-related issues, as well as prescribing medications – says professor Magdalena Bujalska-Zadrożny, head of the Pharmacotherapy and Pharmaceutical Care Institute and Unit at WUM.

Understanding the molecular mechanisms of rapid growth and hearing damage by Vestibular Schwannoma is very important because it may make it possible to identify patients who need to undergo the earliest possible intervention to avoid possible complications of the disease. In the future, it may also contribute to the development of new methods of pharmacological treatment of VS in people who, for various reasons, cannot undergo surgery or experience tumor regrowth after treatment," writes Dr. Małgorzata Litwiniuk-Kosmala, MD, PhD from the Department of Otorhinolaryngology, Head and Neck Surgery UCC WUM.