Latvijas Universitāte

Team Leader

Team Staff

Institute Presentation

Established in 1919, the University of Latvia (LU) has been a national centre of higher education and science for more than a century. LU is one of the largest research universities in the Baltic States, composed of 13 faculties and more than 20 research institutes.

The Institute of Clinical and Preventive Medicine focuses on implementing applied research in the field of public health and disease prevention, including oncology, infectious diseases, internal medicine, visual diagnostics etc. To ensure ethically sound and socially responsible research practices, to engage the general public and patient organizations, as well as to contribute to the research in the field of bioethics and sociology of health and illness, the Institute has established a bioethics research group led by Associated Prof. Signe Mežinska.

Role in the FAMILY project:

In the FAMILY project, the LU group is leading WP8 aimed at the analysis of ethical aspects and social consequences of intergenerational transmission of risk and prediction of mental illness, including ethics of communication of risks, risk perception, ethical and social consequences of risk prediction, reproductive choices, etc.

In close collaboration with other WPs, patients and their families, represented by EUFAMI, LU will perform theoretical and empirical analysis of ethical and social aspects in the context of FAMILY. Based on the analysis, online materials for patients and their families as well as ethical recommendations for professionals will be developed.

The LU group will also assist in ensuring compliance with the research ethics principles and requirements in the FAMILY consortium.