Faculty of Health Care and Social Work of Trnava University in Trnava was founded on July 1, 1994, as another faculty amongst the faculties of the restored Trnava University, which builds on the Trnava University established by Cardinal Peter Pazmáň in 1635 and to the Faculty of Medicine of this university founded in 1770.

Our faculty is true to values, has respect for traditions and is open to new challenges. As an educational institution, our faculty is an attractive modern university that is based on the traditions of the university academic environment as well as the traditional values of European culture. In twenty years of its existence has the faculty made many contacts in the field of teaching, science and research, is actively involved in research projects, cooperates with many foreign universities, is developing and supporting the mobility of students and teachers. Due to the constant attention that we pay to the improvement of studies at our faculty, the Trnava University has been awarded the prestigious ECTS Label and DS Label diplomas, therefore our graduates can successfully find their work also in the international context.

Faculty of Health Care and Social Work was established as the first faculty in Slovakia, which was comprised of the non-medical health care fields of study (laboratory testing methods in health care, nursing care, public health) and social sciences (modern social work) as well. It is truly unique and at the same time also fruitful and successful not only from the pedagogical point of view, but also scientifically. It is not only about the research that can be because of it carried out interdisciplinary but also about the academic climate, which is enriched by this unique situation.

Our faculty focuses not only on its activities in Slovakia. It was, is and wants to remain an international, educational and scientific institution. Furthermore, our workplace in Africa (Kenya) is not only an example of a scientific activity or acquiring of professional erudition for its staff and students, but considering the values that we hold dear, it is also a space for highly humanitarian and charitable work of our teachers and students.

The mission of our faculty is the education of students, postgraduate students and an inseparable part of it is also research in health sciences and social work. However, the outcomes of human science research cannot be ethically neutral. In human sciences, the outcome and sense must always be THE GOOD. The sciences at our faculty are sciences “about human”, and therefore have to be the sciences serving “for man”, in other words for the man´s GOOD. The human sciences are not sciences “about something”, because in the end, it is always “about someone”, about particular person, here and now, about someone who is waiting and needs our help.

All these are the fundamental and essential ethical basis for the preparation of our students for their future work and practice. It is not and cannot be only about a mechanical acquisition of professional  knowledge and skills – our university should leave a well-educated person with anchored values, knowledge and skills, which can be the base for further study, but equally a person which is capable of critical way of thinking and forming of their own opinion.

This faculty is a member of “Association of Educators in Health Care Branches in Slovakia”, moreover it has become (since the current Dean of the faculty was elected as its chairman) also the seat of this Association.

Prof. MUDr. Jaroslav Slaný, CSc.

Dean of the Faculty of Health Care and Social Work