President’s Award

Professor Justo Medrano

Professor Justo Medrano graduated in Medicine at the University of Seville (Spain) in 1963 and the University of Cologne (Germany), where he also did his post graduate training at the University Hospital. In 1972, he was named consultant at the University Hospital of Essen, under the direction of Professor F. W. Eigler, contributing to the development of the pioneer centre for organ transplant in Germany in the seventies. During this period he became Associate Professor of Surgery and coordinator of clinical teaching in surgery.

In 1978, Professor Medrano obtained Professorship at the University of Alicante, (Spain) and in 1990 he moved to the University Miguel Hernández, Elche.Since then he has also been Medical Director and Head of Department for Surgery at the University Hospitals of Elche and San Juan de Alicante. He has also held the position of the Dean of the Faculty of Medicine and Vice-chancellor for International Relations.

Professor Medrano's professional life has been dedicated to both Education and Clinical Activity, constantly working towards the interaction of both. His main lines of research have been in digestive physiology and oncology, as well as in medical education. He is advisor and evaluator to 'The Spanish Foundation for Research in Health' (FIS).

As a surgeon, he has worked primarily on transplants, vascular surgery as well as digestive surgery. He has acted with particular concern for the quality of medical care and consequently has given emphasis to the appropriate indications of blood transfusion as an ethical obligation, advocating the need for further research about the limits of human tolerance in acute anemia. He has been a member of the Commission for Blood Transfusion at San Juan Hospital. In 1998, he presided the XXI International Seminar for Surgery in Alicante focusing on "Surgery without blood", where he promoted this concept, by proposing that the number of transfusions per surgical intervention should be considered as a reference indicator of quality. He is one of the first surgeons in the south of Spain to support bloodless surgery as an ethical right for the Jehovah Witness community. Blood management defined today as a patient driven therapy that only uses blood or blood products as an ultimate solution was his practical concept in the nineties of the last century.

In the area of medical education, he has been a strong advocate of the educational reform programs, focusing on student centered learning and giving greater importance to teaching attitudes. In1996 he created the first Skill Lab in Spain for medical students. He has also been a pioneer of the interuniversity cooperation Project of the European Erasmus Program since its beginnings in 1989 and has been member of the Academic Advisory Group of the Erasmus Program in Brussels.

He has over 150 publications, most of them in peer reviewed journals, more than 200 scientific contributions to congresses based on his clinical work, he is also author of 5 books about surgery and has contributed to more than 50 chapters of text books. He has also organized numerous international seminars for both surgery and education. He is member of the German Association of Surgery, the Spanish Association of surgical oncology and others.

Professor Medrano is past President of the Valencian Society of Surgery, past President of the Valencian Society of Digestive Pathology, Vice -president of the National Deans Conference of Spain. He is also Academic member of the Royal Academy of Medicine of Valencia and of Spain.

At present he is President of the Commission of the new Faculty of Medicine of the University Jaume I in Castellón and member of the Senate of the Universidad Miguel Hernandez of Elche (Alicante) Spain.