The Department of Medicine at Democritus University of Thrace was founded in 1977 (Law 641/1977) and started to run in the academic year 1984-1985 (P.D. 573/1982) in the city of Alexandroupolis, in Thrace. Despite all hardships that a geographically remote University has to confront, the Department has successfully developed an outstanding trajectory by providing to its graduates with teaching and training that fully correspond to the current requirements of undergraduate training as well as high-quality graduate specialization, by producing research that is internationally recognized and highly acclaimed in the scientific press and by providing high standard health services to the population of the wider area.
Via ongoing efforts for scientific and technological upgrade, the Department has turned itself to a magnet forrenowned scientists and researchersboth from other parts of Greece and from abroad. Nowadays, the collaborations with research and academic Greek and foreign institutions are constantly on the increase, so much so as Department’s participation infunded research and development programs. The Department has been the venue for a number of significant conventions and meetings and it has also contributed to research and education as well as to the cultural life of  the local community.
Being highly oriented towards new developments and modernization of the educational process, the Department has a highly attractive syllabus at the undergraduate level of studies that caters for its students’ educational needs in terms of full training and practice in all sectors of the medical science while at the same time it also organizes and offers a series of graduate programs.
The high level of the health services it offers to the population of the wider, outermost region has ultimately imparted a sense of security to them and has also achieved to attract patients from other parts of the country for treatment and therapy. This can also be attributed to the excellent infrastructure of the new University Hospital in Alexandroupolis that has created the necessary conditions for the provision of top quality health services.
Finally, the valuable contribution of the Department to both the cultural and intellectual life of the region should also be stressed that is characterized by its members’ active and vivid participation in cultural unions and events, a fact thatit is highly approved and appraised by the local community.