[On the occasion of the fiftieth anniversary of the Croatian scientific society for the history of health culture].

A group of intellectuals, predominantly lecturers from the Faculty of Medicine, founded in Rijeka on May 29, 1966 the branch of the Yugoslav Scientific Society for the History of Health Culture, which after the independence of Croatia in 1991 continues its work under the name Croatian Scientific Society for the History of Health Culture. Over the past 50 years, within activities of the Society more than 250 professional and scientific conferences have been held in Rijeka and other Croatian cities. In addition, a dozen of professional-scientific trips to neighbouring countries were organized. From the original activities are highlighted the science conventions with international participation "Rijeka and Its Citizens in Medical History", where, since 2001, have been regularly presented free topics from other regions. Another important activity is the international journal "AMHA - Acta medico-historica Adriatica", which has been published since 2003 with two issues per year. Today, this is an established journal present on Medline - PubMed Service, andindexed in several respectable international databases, which guarantees quality and enables access to the world's research community. In 2005, the accompanying "AMHA Library" was launched - a series of monographs devoted to the most important medical historians, scientific conferences dedicated to individual medical laureates, and similar subjects. Ten years ago, the Society's work has been refined by the activities of a group of medical students who, under the motto "In honour of Asclepius and Orpheus", strive to affirm the links between medicine and art. Of the many performances the most significant is the traditional humanitarian concert, attended by students from all faculties of medicine from Croatia and Ljubljana.