Professor Kyriaki Karavanaki was admitted with an honorary scholarship at the Medical School of the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, Greece, after successfully undertaking the Panhellenic Exams, and graduated with the grade of “Excellent”.

She worked for 3 years as a Research Fellow in Pediatric Endocrinology and Diabetes, at the Pediatric Endocrinology and Diabetes Unit of the University Department of Pediatrics, Royal Hospital for Sick Children, Bristol, UK. There, she also undertook and completed her PhD thesis, entitled: “Early indices of diabetic neuropathy and nephropathy in children and adolescents with type 1 Diabetes Mellitus in Avon County, UK”, with sponsorship from 2 scholarships from Greece and the United States.

She completed her specialty in Pediatrics for four years in the 1st University Department of Pediatrics, “Aghia Sofia” Children’s Hospital, Athens, |Greece (Professor N. Matsaniotis). Afterwards, she was trained for three years as a paid Research Fellow in the Pediatric Endocrinology and Diabetes Unit of the 1st University Department of Pediatrics, “Aghia Sofia” Children’s Hospital (Professor A.Dakou-Voutetaki). During her subspecialty training, apart from she training in various issues of Pediatric Endocrinology and diabetes, she participated in the National European multicenter study KIGS. She also dealt with the epidemiology of Type 1 Diabetes Mellitus in Greece.

In 2003 she was elected as a Lecturer in the 2nd University Department of Pediatrics,“P&A Kyriakou” Children’s Hospital, Athens, Greece. During the following years, she continued working in this Department, having ascended all the academic hierarchy positions, achieving the title of Professor in Pediatrics and Pediatric Endocrinology in September 2018.

During the past 23 years Prof.Karavanaki has been working as a Pediatrician, being responsible or one out of 4 wards of the 2nd University Department of Pediatrics; in parallel she has been Head of the Diabetes and Metabolism Unit of the same Department. In this Unit, approximately 300 children and adolescents are monitored, mostly with Type 1 Diabetes (T1D) using all the modern technologies (insulin pumps, hybrid pancreas, continuous glucose monitoring). Moreover, patients with more rare types of diabetes such as type 2 diabetes, MODY syndrome, or neonatal diabetes etc are also followed, as well as patients suffering from overweight/obesity, or impaired glucose-insulin metabolism.

Moreover, since 2003 Professor Karavanaki has achieved great clinical work, since she has been responsible for the management of all newly diagnosed patients with T1D in our Department, which culminate up to 50% of all diabetes cases admitted annually to the hospital.

Additionally, she has accumulated excellence in training numerous Pediatricians, Endocrinologists and Medical Students, in Pediatric Diabetology over the last 25 years.

Considering positions of responsibility, the professor was elected as a member of the administration council of the Panhellenic Obesity Association for 4 years, and as a member in the Ministry’s National Center of Diabetes (E.KE.DI.) for 3 years.

Finally, Professor Karavanaki serves as a consult of editorial committees of international scientific journals and has written chapters in textbooks for pre- and postgraduate courses, has over 95 publications in peer-reviewed scientific journals with 3500 citations in national literature.

Lastly, she has supervised many PhDs and postgraduate theses.