PHOTO // Seven Students from Nicolae Testemitanu State University of Medicine and Pharmacy complete academic exchange at Lisbon School of Health

Seven second-year students from the Bachelor’s degree programme in Radiologic Technology and Imaging at Faculty of Medicine No. 1 of the Nicolae Testemitanu State University of Medicine and Pharmacy (USMF) have benefited from an academic mobility at the Lisbon School of Health, Portugal.

Vlada-Vladislava Vulpe, Paula-Patricia Lavric, Mădălina Balan, Victor Gherghelegiu, Alexandru Tolică, Mihaela Ciornaia, and Claudia Morandini took part in an exchange of experience within the Blended Intensive Programme (BIP), titled, Claustrophobia and Anxiety in Medical Imaging and Radiotherapy.

The course was held in a hybrid format and brought together 28 international students from prestigious European institutions: Iuliu Hațieganu University of Medicine and Pharmacy of Cluj-Napoca (Romania), the University of Florence (Italy), and Metropolia University of Applied Sciences from Helsinki (Finland).

During the mobility, the students participated in case presentations and simulated clinical scenarios in the laboratories of the Lisbon School. In the end, the medical students formed multidisciplinary teams together with colleagues from the other partner universities, with the aim of developing scientific articles to be published on the UREKA Connects platform.

The students were accompanied by Angela Cazacu-Stratu, Associate Professor in the Hygiene Discipline at the Department of Preventive Medicine and Vice-Dean of Faculty of Medicine No. 1, and Evelina Gherghelegiu, Head of the Department of External Relations and European Integration.

The initiative, organized by the Bachelor’s programme in Medical Imaging and Radiotherapy at ESSL, addressed an essential topic for clinical practice: managing anxiety and claustrophobia in imaging and radiotherapy settings. The programme was coordinated by Maria Margarida Ribeiro. Thus, anxiety and claustrophobia were analyzed as significant obstacles in medical imaging and radiotherapy. MRI, CT, and PET/CT procedures were discussed from the perspective of their psychological impact on patients, as they require remaining immobile in confined and noisy spaces, a situation that can trigger fear, tension and discomfort.

In Radiotherapy, the challenge was highlighted as being amplified by the length of treatment, which involves multiple successive sessions. The use of masks and immobilization systems, indispensable for therapeutic precision, can create a sense of physical constraint, stress and emotional difficulties, affecting the patient’s experience and, in some situations, the quality of the therapeutic act.

The Blended Intensive Programme is an innovative educational format developed under the Erasmus+ programme, combining online learning activities with a short-term physical mobility component. These programmes bring together students and teaching staff from more European institutions and promote international academic collaboration, interactive learning, and an interdisciplinary approach to topics of European relevance, facilitating the exchange of good practices, the development of transversal skills and the strengthening of the international dimension of higher education.