August 15, 2021 - In 2018, Professor Tina Dušek, MD, Ph.D. organized the first Šolta Island Medicine Summer School to show young doctors that landing a job in a rural area was the best thing that could happen to them. The planned number of participants was 25. After receiving a staggering 300 applications, she knew she was on the right path.

If you are someone who grew up in a city, it is likely that the word ''island'' to you represents a picture of an everlasting summer. Salty air, gentle breeze, the sound of crashing waves. Peace and quiet. Who could want anything more?

For all their business during the summer, Croatian islands are experiencing depopulation. As much as people enjoy spending their holiday there, few would decide to extend their stay to all 365 days of the year.

All the things that attract tourists - the remoteness, the fact that there is no rush and no traffic, also mean the absence of many advantages of our modern-day life, one of them being the availability of state-of-the-art medical services. The thought puts off both ''regular'' people as well as budding medical professionals.

In order to change that, Tina Dušek, a professor at the Medical School of the University of Zagreb and an internal medicine specialist, with the support of the Croatian Society for Endocrinology and Diabetology organized the first Island Medicine Summer School (Croatian: Ljetna škola otočne medicine) in Stomorska on the island of Šolta, intended for medical students in their final years of study and newly-graduated doctors.

This September will see its third edition of Island Medicine Summer School, with the one last year being postponed due to the pandemic. 

Why a school of ''island medicine''? 

As explained on their page, ''the island symbolizes a geographically isolated area whose population has difficulty accessing larger health facilities. Such conditions - whether truly on an island or in a remote continental town - require the comprehensive training of a doctor, who must be an internist, a surgeon, an obstetrician, a radiologist, a psychiatrist, and more. In the absence of sophisticated diagnostic and therapeutic methods, the most valuable medical tool is the knowledge and experience, which we want to pass onto you''.                                                                                           

Island Medicine Summer School has two goals. One, to help young doctors gain authentic life and professional experience, and to increase their interest in professional engagement in geographically isolated environments, and the other, to contribute to the quality of life and health care in other geographically isolated areas.

In short, the Summer School prepares its participants to diagnose and treat patients in places without sophisticated diagnostic and therapeutic methods available.

''Bring medicine back to a human level''

As professor Tina Dušek explains, ''21st-century medicine strongly relies on arranging a dozen different tests and diagnostic procedures, a patient gets a referral for this and a referral for that. In the end, it results in moving away from person-centered care.

Our motivation was to think about medicine in ''island conditions'', that is, in absence of sophisticated diagnostic and therapeutic methods, the way it looked a hundred years ago, when a doctor or a medicine man, if you will, a healer, had nothing but his hands, his knowledge, experience, and his emotion to work with.

That is the idea of our Island Medicine Summer School – to bring medicine back to a human and humane level, where a relationship between a patient and a doctor is in the foreground and a starting point for everything else.''

One thing that professor Dušek has emphasized again and again throughout our conversation was the importance of human touch and empathy. It is easy to learn to do X if Y, to follow the steps you have been taught as a student. Prescribe this, refer to that specialist, make an appointment for a procedure - everyone can do that. However, there is more to a good doctor than issuing a correct diagnosis. 

The right approach is everything, according to professor Dušek. Empathy, emotional intelligence, the patience to stop and truly listen to what people are saying - that is what makes a great doctor.

''Small communities are excellent ground for making a lasting impact''

''On the one hand, we still have people who approach medical professionals with reverence and unease. On the other, young doctors are often still building their confidence and can also feel unsure on the best way to speak to a patient. That is why I think that getting a position in a rural area, a small town, on an island, is a great path to self-developing both as an individual and as a doctor. Small communities are perfect for those with the desire and ambition to make an impact, come up with a project that will add to society in some way. When you work as an island doctor, you get to know your patients, you develop a connection.

Sometimes, they will come not because they need medical assistance, but because they need someone to talk to. Doctors working in rural areas will have an easier time to stand out and to bring about a positive change, much more effectively than they would in a complex system such as a clinical center in a big city.''

''An overwhelming response already producing results''

I ask if they have already heard from former participants of past Summer Schools. Is the changing perception of working in rural areas already noticeable? 

''Yes, it is. Off the top of my head, there is one colleague who accepted a job on Murter and another who works in Sisak-Moslavina County. During our first year, in 2018. we received 300 applications. We try to choose candidates who have already shown interest in volunteering and working in the community. Grades are not the deciding factor here. As students are accepted based on a motivation letter, we also try to take into consideration that not everyone has a way with words. We try to give a chance to a diverse set of candidates. 

''Participants work in small groups intensively with instructors, solving professional tasks in a "problem based" form and practicing manual skills. The local community has welcomed our initiative, as we organize free blood pressure and blood sugar measurement.''

For more stories about great initiatives such as this one, CLICK HERE.

November 27, 2020 – Vis islanders are these days not surprised to receive guests who come from all over the world, but the mysterious arrival of a crocodile has raised eyebrows and caused big-teethed smiles

For thousands of years, the inhabitants of Vis island have led a comparatively unharassed existence. They fished in the richly stocked waters that surround them and planted vines and other crops in the island's soils, such day-today activities unaffected by whichever empire decided to lay claim to the rock. Being the inhabited island which lies furthest from the Croatian mainland might have contributed to so many carefree days. That's not to say that nobody ever goes there.

Today a popular tourist destination, over the last few decades Vis island has welcomed visitors from all over the world. Although, the latest exotic arrival doesn't look to have come by budget airline. Found on a boat near the village of Brgujac, a young crocodile has caused bewilderment among island residents over recent days.


Brgujac. The epicentre of Vis island's punk-croc scene? © Tourist Board island Vis

Snapped on the waterfront of Brgujac and posted to the Facebook group 'Moj otok Vis (My island Vis)', the uncommon visitor has raised both eyebrows and merriment. Nobody is quite sure how the crocodile got here, not least the sailor on whose boat the crocodile was found.

Nobody knows of anyone keeping a crocodile as a pet on the island. The sailor and his boat haven't travelled anywhere that far over recent weeks. Vis island's long distance from the Croatian coast does theoretically place it closer to the African continent, where a crocodile might be more naturally found. But it's only relatively nearer. Africa is still over 1500 kilometres away. This youngster doesn't look to be capable of making such a swim. And, besides, although some do live in saltwater - most crocodiles prefer to spend their time in freshwater.

While the mystery of where the young crocodile came from is being solved, he's been taken off the sailor's boat. The crocodile was initially placed in the care of workers from the municipal company Gradina.

We recently reported on an unusual job offer on the island of Sestrunj in the Zadar archipelago. What might appear to many to be a simple job working in a shop has attracted a rather large amount of attention, from Croatia, Europe, and even beyond.

As Poslovni Dnevnik writes on the 8th of April, 2019, there haven't been any schools on the island of Sestrunj for a long time now, and on the island itself, there are only twenty permanent residents.

While Croats tend to move to Ireland in their droves for work opportunities, higher salaries and more job security, Sestrunj, a small island in the Zadar archipelago, has been attracting attention from all sides since the posting of a job offer in a shop on the island, with would-be employees making contact from Ireland, Germany, and even all the way from America, as RTL reports.

Sestrunj - a little island close to Zadar, hasn't even had a shop for four months, and the only the place where you can go and have a drink is at some sort of pensioner's association on the island.

Since Sestrunj has been without a shop for the last four months, supplying the island naturally poses a big problem.

Eventually, the powers that be decided that Sestrunj's store needed to make a return to the island and contacted some commercial chains, and as the first condition for the job, they needed a person who would be willing to move to the island and live there. The interest in the small shop was quite surprising, and so far as many as forty job applications from around the world have arrived on Sestrunj's quiet shores.

"There were mostly people from Slavonia, and there were also people from the United States, Germany, Canada, a gentleman from Ireland called, he was willing to come back to the area," said Nenad Šužberić from Sestrunj.

"They're sick of the crowds in the city, they're probably expecting to come and have some peace on the island and all that," said Sestrunj resident Berislav Fatović.

The shop will need to be done up, but the apartment for the person who will work there is ready.

"It's nice to live here because it's quiet and it's different way of life than in Zadar, in town, but we're missing this shop because you need to think about the most basic necessities in advance, to make sure you've everything you need to have in the house," admitted Zdravka Dilber.

With the re-opening of Sestrunj's shop, everything would be much easier for the island's residents.

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