The primary function of medical operations, centred at the Space Medicine Office (SMO) in the

European Astronaut Centre The European Astronaut Centre (EAC) (German: Europäisches Astronautenzentrum, French: Centre des astronautes européens), is an establishment of the European Space Agency and home of the European Astronaut Corps. It is near to Cologne, Germany, ...

Cologne Cologne ( ; german: Köln ; ksh, Kölle ) is the largest city of the German western States of Germany, state of North Rhine-Westphalia (NRW) and the List of cities in Germany by population, fourth-most populous city of Germany with 1.1 m ...

, Germany, is to maximize the operational effectiveness and minimize risks to the health of the European

astronauts An astronaut (from the Ancient Greek (), meaning 'star', and (), meaning 'sailor') is a person trained, equipped, and deployed by a human spaceflight program to serve as a commander or crew member aboard a spacecraft. Although generally r ...

involved in

human space flight Human spaceflight (also referred to as manned spaceflight or crewed spaceflight) is spaceflight with a crew or passengers aboard a spacecraft, often with the spacecraft being operated directly by the onboard human crew. Spacecraft can also be ...

. Furthermore, SMO also functions as a means of support to ESA astronaut families throughout their careers. In order to fulfill this function SMO provides

flight surgeon A flight surgeon is a military medical officer practicing in the clinical field of aviation medicine. Although the term "flight surgery" is considered improper by purists, it may occasionally be encountered. Flight surgeons are physicians ( MD ...

services in combination with direct

biomedical engineer Biomedicine (also referred to as Western medicine, mainstream medicine or conventional medicine)

support. To be fully effective these key areas of service provision require additional in-house supporting elements namely; exercise science, rehabilitation, IT and project management capabilities.

References

{{Reflist European Space Agency