During 17-18 February, 2016, in the frame of Tempus MEDGEN project the training program was organized and held in Israel for the specialists of Technion University. Many specialists from other institutions and medical centers were also invited to the training. The training was conducted by Professor Heather Skirton and Specialists in Genetic Counseling Selina Goodman and Peter Lunt from Plymouth University, UK.
 
The sessions included frontal lectures combined with an open discussion, and role plays in small groups followed by discussion in a large group. This form of seminar enabled knowledge exchanging between Prof. Skirton and her colleagues and the Israeli counselors and Geneticists participating in the seminar, most of them are significantly experienced. Improving counseling and psychological skills is a very important issue, not attended enough in our routine professional life. The seminar was an important opportunity of meeting between counselors and doctors, both outside and inside of Israel, from different Genetic centers. It helps us developing tools for improving these skills. The seminar included approaches for dealing with uncertainty, ambiguous test results, improving decision making process, understanding psychological motives of both patients and service giver. In addition, it exposed us to teaching techniques for genetic counseling students and different health care professionals. 

At the end there was a closing session where General discussion on Professional issues and Boundaries and the best approaches were held.Summarized by the team of genetic counselors of EmeK Medical Center: Efrat Mamlouk, Lilach Peled-Peretz, Olfat Abu-Leil Zouabi

Training Agenda