The Walter Siegenthaler Memorial Lecture has been held since 2010 in honor of Walter Siegenthaler and his wife, Gertrud Siegenthaler. Since 2021, the lecture has been held as part of the Zurich Academy of Internal Medicine (ZAIM) MediDays in Zurich.
In August 2026, Prof. Dr. Petra-Maria Schumm-Draeger from the Zentrum Innere Medizin Fünf Höfe in Munich delivered the Memorial Lecture. In her presentation, she demonstrated how an interdisciplinary perspective can provide new impetus for diabetology. She emphasized that a successful treatment requires an interdisciplinary and individualized view of the whole person. This calls for a collaborative approach that transcends disciplinary, sectoral, and national boundaries—in clinical practice, science, research, and teaching, as well as in education, continuing education, and professional development. Diabetology, she noted, can serve as a model for medicine as a whole and exemplify how such an approach can succeed.
Speaker Prof. Dr. Petra-Maria Schumm-Draeger (center) with Board of Trustees member Prof. Dr. Edouard Battegay and Board of Trustees Chair Prof. Dr. Beatrice Beck Schimmer.
