[ACADEMY AND PUBLIC HOSPITALS - MUTUALLY BENEFICIAL AND SYNERGISTIC RELATIONSHIP].

Modern medicine deals with the combined quality of the profession and the medical service. The first rule of medicine is Primum non nocere" (first, do no harm). However, the essence of this unique profession cannot be confined by this basic message phrased by negation, but should be based on the principle of doing one's best to save the patient's life and to cure him. In this academic and dynamic profession, the physician keeps asking himself frequently whether the provided treatment is the best one possible. The internal need to answer this question and the concomitant curiosity, create the necessary critical integration between the physician and the researcher. Medical research is essential for the promotion of the profession, and it is a vital tool that leads to excellence in healthcare services. Throughout recent years the hospitals in Israel's Northern District, from Nazareth and Nahariya to Ziv, are in a continuous process of development and advancement with the aim to provide modern and available medical services of the highest quality to the residents of the area, tourists, IDF soldiers and even for those who arrive from across the border. This growth and development is reflected in the provision of new services, alongside the improvement of existing resources, and is based on collaboration between experienced and new staff transferred from various regions in Israel. The Medical Faculty of Bar Ilan University in Safed plays a significant and dominant part in this change. The affiliation of the hospitals to the faculty, the establishment of new research laboratories in hospitals, additional educational services for students, such as the pathology laboratory in Ziv, and, of course, the medical students studying in different departments - all of these constitute a thriving engine for the academy, combining teaching with promotion of research. Researchers and physicians from the hospitals are integrated in the medical school, in teaching, research and mentoring students. Department directors and senior physicians create an atmosphere of learning, among others, for the population of interns and trainees who are integrated in teaching and in the new research laboratories. The administrations of the hospitals and the faculty cooperate and work in synergy in order to promote the physicians and the researchers who are already working in the region and to attract new professionals to join them. The new academic climate is also the product of cooperation with regional colleges, Safed and Tel-Hai, as well as the work of MIGAL Galilee Research Institute and the support provided by the Ministry of Health and the Ministry for the Development of the Negev and Galilee. We strive to attract the faculty graduates to stay in the region, and to build a high-quality professional future for the essential medical services in the Israel's Northern District.