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Institute

About PIEBM

The Polish Institute for Evidence Based Medicine (PIEBM) is a nonprofit nongovernmental foundation established in 2003.

The Institute excels in producing medical publications, digital resources, and continuing medical education (CME) activities for health care professionals and medical students.

Through effective knowledge translation we aim to make emerging scientific data easier to comprehend and more relevant for everyday medical practice. Our ultimate goal is to improve the quality of health care and medical education worldwide.

We are proud to have worked with some of the most influential medical centers, schools, and societies around the world. We appreciate the unique value of these collaborations and are delighted to see educational resources developed at PIEBM used in real-life scenarios by our partners.

Mission

The mission of PIEBM is to promote and facilitate evidence-based medicine (EBM) and medical ethics through education and research.

This goal is being fulfilled by:

  • Producing and distributing up-to-date and reliable information useful in everyday medical practice
  • Teaching the skills necessary for the efficient use of current medical knowledge
  • Initiating and providing methodological support for the development and dissemination of clinical practice guidelines within medical communities
  • Offering educational, consulting, and advisory services for planning and conducting clinical research as well as analyzing and presenting research outcomes
  • Conducting research in the fields of clinical epidemiology, clinical research methodology, clinical practice guidelines, systematic reviews and meta-analyses, clinical decision-making, health care quality, medical education, and other associated fields serving similar purposes
  • Facilitating cooperation between Polish medical professionals and experts in the field of EBM around the world

Executive Board

  • Dr. Piotr Gajewski, MD, PhD – President of the Polish Institute for Evidence Based Medicine
  • Prof. Roman Jaeschke, MD, MSc – Vice-President of the Polish Institute for Evidence Based Medicine

Team

  • Agata Salwińska, MA – Executive Director
  • Karolina Kopczyńska-Rojek, MA – Managing Editor, McMaster Textbook of Internal Medicine
  • Aleksandra Kubiec, MA – Managing Editor, Interna Szczeklika Ukrainian Edition
  • Aleksandra Stachowiak, MA – Managing Editor, Medicina Interna Basada en la Evidencia
  • Marta Pasiut, MA – Conference Manager

Scientific Committee

  • Prof. Andrzej Budaj (Centre of Postgraduate Medical Education, Warsaw, Poland)
  • Prof. Leszek Czupryniak (Medical University of Warsaw, Poland)
  • Prof. Andrzej Dąbrowski (Medical University of Bialystok, Poland)
  • Prof. Ryszard Gellert (Centre of Postgraduate Medical Education, Warsaw, Poland)
  • Prof. Andrzej Januszewicz (The Cardinal Stefan Wyszyński Institute of Cardiology, Warsaw, Poland)
  • Prof. Rafał Krenke (Medical University of Warsaw, Poland)
  • Dr. Jakub Pawlikowski (Medical University of Lublin, Poland)
  • Prof. Piotr Ponikowski (Wroclaw Medical University, Poland)
  • Prof. Marek Ruchała (Poznan University of Medical Sciences, Poland)
  • Prof. Bogdan Solnica (Jagiellonian University Medical College, Kraków, Poland)
  • Prof. Hanna Szajewska (Medical University of Warsaw, Poland)
  • Prof. Anetta Undas (Jagiellonian University Medical College, Kraków, Poland)
  • Prof. Jerzy Windyga (Institute of Hematology and Transfusion Medicine, Warsaw, Poland)

International Advisory Committee

  • Prof. Bernd W. Böttiger (University Hospital of Cologne, Germany)
  • Prof. Deborah Cook (McMaster University, Hamilton, ON, Canada)
  • Prof. Mark Crowther (McMaster University, Hamilton, ON, Canada)
  • Prof. Phillip Dellinger (Cooper Medical School of Rowan University, Camden, NY, USA)
  • Prof. James Douketis (McMaster University, Hamilton, ON, Canada)
  • Prof. Gordon Guyatt (McMaster University, Hamilton, ON, Canada)
  • Prof. Ana Hategan (McMaster University, Hamilton, ON, Canada)
  • Prof. Alfonso Iorio (McMaster University, Hamilton, ON, Canada)
  • Prof. Günther Jonitz (Berlin Chamber of Physicians, Germany)
  • Prof. Sharon Marr (McMaster University, Hamilton, ON, Canada)
  • Prof. Paul Moayyedi (McMaster University, Hamilton, ON, Canada)
  • Prof. Nicola Montano (University of Milan, Milan, Italy)
  • Prof. Victor M. Montori (Mayo Medical School, Mayo Clinic, Rochester, MN, USA)
  • Prof. Paul O´Byrne (McMaster University, Hamilton, ON, Canada)
  • Prof. Simon Oczkowski (McMaster University, Hamilton, ON, Canada)
  • Prof. Akbar Panju (McMaster University, Hamilton, ON, Canada)
  • Prof. Alexandra Papaioannou (McMaster University, Hamilton, ON, Canada)
  • Prof. René Rodríguez-Gutiérrez (Universidad Autonoma de Nuevo Leon, Mexico)
  • Prof. Holger Schünemann (McMaster University, Hamilton, ON, Canada)
  • Prof. Serhat Unal (Hacettepe University, Ankara, Turkey)
  • Prof. Harriette Van Spall (McMaster University, Hamilton, ON, Canada)
  • Prof. Jean-Louis Vincent (Université Libre de Bruxelles, Brussels, Belgium)
  • Prof. Jadwiga Wedzicha (Imperial College London, UK)

Audit Board

  • Prof. Małgorzata Krajnik, MD, PhD (Ludwik Rydygier Collegium Medicum in Bydgoszcz, Nicolaus Copernicus University in Toruń, Poland) – Chair
  • Prof. Wojciech Szczeklik, MD, PhD (Jagiellonian University Medical College, Kraków, Poland) – Member
  • Renata Zaręba, MA – Member

Partner institutions

Our patron

Professor Andrzej Szczeklik at the piano in the clinic on Skawińska Street in Kraków, Poland (Photo: Zbigniew Łagocki)

The patient comes with his pain, suffering, crying for help. And the doctor, not minding the patient’s—and his own—fear, knowing how little he knows (which is never enough), says: I will stand beside you, together we will look danger in the face.

Prof. Andrzej Szczeklik

Professor Andrzej Szczeklik, MD, PhD, was born on 29 July 1938 in Kraków, Poland, and passed away on 3 February 2012.

In 1961, he graduated from the Copernicus Academy of Medicine in Kraków, Faculty of Medicine. He continued his postgraduate training abroad, including the United States and Sweden. He defended his doctoral (1966) and then postdoctoral thesis (1969) at the Academy of Medicine in Wrocław, Poland, where he worked in the years 1964-1971. In January 1972, he was appointed head of the Department of Allergy at the Copernicus Academy of Medicine in Kraków. In 1979, he became associate professor, followed by full professor in 1989. Professor Szczeklik was a visiting professor at the University of Sheffield, UK (1985), King’s College School of Medicine, UK (1986-1989), and Hochgebirgsklinik Davos-Wolfgang, Switzerland (1987-1996). In the years 1990-1993, he held the office of the rector (president) of the Academy of Medicine in Kraków. In the years 1993-1996, after restoring medical faculties to the Jagiellonian University, he held the office of the vice-rector for Collegium Medicum.

His scientific interests focused mainly on the mechanisms underlying atherosclerosis and asthma, in particular the effects of acetylsalicylic acid (aspirin). In 1975, he proposed a theory on the development of the so-called aspirin-induced asthma, which was substantiated and became widely accepted over the following years. In 1976, after injecting himself and colleagues from his research team with a newly discovered substance called prostacyclin, he described its effects in humans for the first time in history.

In 1997, he was awarded a prestigious prize by The Lancet for the discovery of the genetic basis for bronchial asthma. A year later, the Royal College of Physicians of London awarded him honorary membership for his research on the mechanisms of blood clotting in cardiovascular diseases. In 1998, he received the first prize of the Polish Academy of Sciences. In 2001, he was honored with the first award of the American Academy of Allergy, Asthma and Immunology (AAAAI). In 2008, he received the Clemens von Pirquet Award of the European Academy of Allergy and Clinical Immunology (EAACI).

He wrote about 600 papers published in such journals as Nature, The Lancet, Journal of Clinical Investigation, Circulation, Blood, American Journal of Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine, Journal of Allergy and Clinical Immunology, Allergy, and Thorax. He also authored several monographs and textbooks published in the United States, United Kingdom, and France, among others. He was the editor in chief of the first Polish evidence-based medicine textbook: Choroby wewnętrzne (Internal Medicine; first edition published in 2005), which is currently named after him (Interna Szczeklika, or Szczeklik’s Internal Medicine).

He was a member of the Pontifical Academy of Sciences, the vice‑president of the Polish Academy of Arts and Sciences since 2006, and a member of the Polish Academy of Sciences since 1998. He was awarded doctorate honoris causa degrees by the Wrocław Medical University (1999), Medical University of Warsaw (2002), of Silesia (2002), of Łódź (2003), and the Jagiellonian University in Kraków (2009).

Professor Andrzej Szczeklik was also a writer and an essayist. He wrote two books nominated to the Polish literary prize Nike: Catharsis: On the Art of Medicine (translated into English, Hungarian, French, Russian, and Spanish) and Kore: On Sickness, the Sick, and the Search for the Soul of Medicine (translated into English, Spanish, Hungarian, Lithuanian, and German). His third book, Nieśmiertelność. Prometejski sen medycyny (Immortality: a Promethean Dream of Medicine), was published posthumously.