DEPARTMENT OF VETERINARY PUBLIC HEALTH
History
Our department started to be active as the Department of Food Hygiene and Technology under the Department of Diseases and Clinical Sciences in the 1995-1996 academic year of the Faculty of Veterinary Medicine. In 2009, it was decided to increase the number of departments in Veterinary Faculties to five and to establish one of these departments under the name of Food Hygiene and Technology Department pursuant to Article 13 of the Law No. 2547.
Purpose
The Department primarily aims to provide undergraduate students of the Faculty of Veterinary Medicine with high standards of theoretical and practical knowledge on the quality and safety of animal foods, food technology and preservation, examinations of animals raised for their meat, food quality management systems, legislative knowledge and veterinary public health.
Besides providing students with theoretical and applied knowledge based on basic and problem solving within the scope of scientific developments, the department aims to contribute to the training of self-confident and competent veterinarians by providing them with the practical skills they will need while doing their profession, to equip students with scientific evidence oriented and research-oriented information at the graduate level and to guide them to carry out original and innovative scientific studies that can produce solutions to national and international problems related to their field. Within the scope of lifelong learning, our department organizes various events in its own fields of activity.
Vision
The vision of our department is to contribute to the creation and continuity of healthy society by training veterinarians who are aware of the relationship between animal health and consumer health, who will actively carry out food quality controls and who have knowledge of food safety management systems and production technologies.
Mission
The main objectives of the Department of Food Hygiene and Technology are as follows: i) to transfer basic and current information theoretically and practically to undergraduate students on food microbiology, food chemistry, meat science, meat hygiene and inspection, dairy science, milk hygiene and technology and veterinary public health, ii) To present the results obtained by conducting various projects, research activities and studies at national and international platforms and to ensure that the results reach the relevant authorities, iii) to train specialists by means of postgraduate education, iv) to contribute to the scientific development by contributing to the technologies related to the safe production of animal foods by protecting public health.
At the department, original studies are carried out on basic topics such as foodborne pathogens, main sources of contamination of foods, antimicrobial resistance in foodborne pathogens, food chemistry, food residues and contaminants, alternative natural food additives, molecular genetics and public health.
Postgraduate Education
Food Hygiene and Technology Department Master's Program was opened in 2001, and Food Hygiene and Technology Department PhD Program was opened in 2005. In line with the decisions of the Council of Higher Education on the minimum requirements for PhD Programs, joint Master’s and PhD Programs were approved by the Council of Higher Education and implemented between 2013-2019 in cooperation with our Department and the Department of Food Hygiene and Technology, Faculty of Veterinary Medicine /Kırıkkale University. Since 2019, Master’s and PhD programs have been actively continuing to provide education within Erciyes University Graduate School of Health Sciences.
Undergraduate Education Course Contents
Course Code and Name
| Compulsory/ Elective
| Theoretical
| Practice
| ECTS
|
| 3.2.02 Food Hygiene and Control | Compulsory | 2 | 2 | 4 |
| 4.2.01 Meat Hygiene, Inspection and Technology | Compulsory | 2 | 3 | 2 |
| 4.2.08 Dairy Hygiene and Technology | Compulsory | 2 | 3 | 3 |
| 5.1.08 Veterinary Public Health | Compulsory
| 2 | 0 | 2 |
| 5.2 Veterinary Medicine Maturation Training | Compulsory | 12 | 8 | 30 |
Information about the Department of Veterinary Public Health
Our department started to be active on 29.08.2012 as the Veterinary Public Health Department affiliated to the Food Hygiene and Technology Department in the 2012-2013 academic year of the Faculty of Veterinary Medicine.
Vision:
- to explain the diagnosis of zoonotic diseases by emphasizing the importance of our duties and responsibilities in public health and the concept of food safety from farm to table.
- Veterinary Public Health should be taken into consideration and implemented in the planning of all kinds of social, medical and economic services that affect human health. Thus, veterinary areas of expertise can help to improve human health and Veterinary Public Health units can provide an effective link on this path.
- The role of veterinary services in cross-sectoral activities in agriculture-based countries is important in terms of offering new approaches to primary health care programs and environmental health for public health.
Mission:
In order to protect and improve individual and community health and to increase the quality of life of individuals;
- to determine the characteristics of zoonoses,
- to diagnose and treat them and to take necessary control measures,
- to ensure the quality control in animal food production (safe food from farm to table),
- to prevent animal bites, poisonings and other animal-based hazards that may pose a danger to public health.
