The Faculty of Medicine uses various channels to publish news items about doctoral theses. The basic rule is that publication takes place on the university web, while theses that meet specific criteria can be published externally as a press release.
Many theses within the departments of the Faculty of Medicine may be interesting in the university world, but based on experience, they do not lead to news items in public media since they do not respond to news media criteria. Therefore, the normal case is that news items about doctoral theses are published on the university web, and in special cases will they be published as press release.
It is the faculty communication officer who has the faculty management's task to make a news evaluation and take responsibility for publication.
The work process is that the doctoral student in good time before his doctoral thesis completes a form on Aurora with a summary of the thesis. It is recommended to also save the text as a Word-document in your computer, in case something fails. A faculty communication officer then estimates whether the submitted text should become a web news item. In that case, the doctoral student's text is added as news item in Faculty's news feed after some minor editing. However, please note that these news items are posted on open pages in the web that are visible to the general public. It is therefore quite possible to send a web link to the news item to people even outside the university who you think may be interested.
If the faculty communication officer estimates that the dissertation meets the criteria for external news, the communicator officer will collaborate together with the doctoral student on an external press release. This judgement should not be regarded as any form of grading on the thesis, but merely deals with identifying which target audience a publication is aimed at.
Some criteria for when a thesis can be judged suitable for external publication/press release:
• Consistency - many people are affected.
• Proximity - geographically, temporally or culturally close.
• Deviation - results that are unusual, unexpected or dramatic.
• Exclusivity - we are alone or first about the news.
• Timeliness - the news relates to a current topic.
• Imagery - there is a unique image material.
• Public interest - the news can alert the public to risks.
• Comprehension - the news can be explained so a normal newspaper reader understands it.