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SOcuiternecaech Science Basement

With an ever-increasing public interest in personal health and genomics and The Science Basement is a group of
with our focus on public health impact, reaching out and communicating with junior scientists who are enthu-
the public have become more important than ever before. For example, we siastic about communicating
have seen significant growth in all of our digital communication platforms, science, including work done at
especially Twitter and LinkedIn. This rise in public engagement allows us to FIMM, and teaching others to do
communicate the meaning and importance of the research conducted at the same. The Science Basement
FIMM to a wide audience through different media. started with a group of PhD stu-
Each year, we have hundreds of national and international visitors from dents who kicked off the FIMM-
academia, industry and policy makers, and we host approximately ten school DSHealth Communication Club
group visits every year. Our researchers talk about their science with visitors activities in 2016. It quickly grew
and speak at many other events targeted towards the general public. into an independent non-profit
We also work with national and international media to provide journalists organisation in Finland, with the
with accurate information about our research topics and findings. We issue goal of providing an inclusive net-
press releases, invite media representatives to visit our facilities and partici- work and platform for scientists
pate in our events and encourage our researchers to give interviews. interested in learning science com-
Effective science communication takes practice, and we strive to offer courses munication skills, with a particular
and workshops for our junior scientists and individual coaching for our senior focus on early-career researchers
scientists. and trainees who are doing so for
the first time.
FIMM – Building a Bridge from Discovery to Medicine
”Patient Perspectives
and Self-efficacy in
Cancer Research”
Course

In 2021, Dr. Emmy Verschuren
organised a new type of doc-
toral training course to facilitate
knowledge exchange between
cancer patients and researchers.
The main aim of the course was
to include experienced cancer
perspectives in the formulation of
research ideas through lectures,
reflection groups, and co-creative
science and art exercises. The
course brought together 10
biomedicine doctoral researchers
and 10 persons closely affected by
cancer. Participants found the new
approach rewarding and thought-
provoking and, encouraged by
this feedback, the course will be
organised again soon.

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