Georgian Dictionary
of Public Health
Twenty years in the making — and not yet finished
The idea was born in Geneva, in 2006, in the corridors of the WHO headquarters on Avenue Appia. Giorgi Pkhakadze, then working with the World Health Organization, confronted a problem that every Georgian public health professional already knew: the Georgian language had no standardised public health terminology. Georgian students read English textbooks and debated in Georgian with improvised, inconsistent translations. Georgian laws and regulations used ad hoc terminology with no scientific consensus behind it. Clinicians, academics, students and policymakers all used different Georgian words for the same concept.
— Prof. Giorgi Pkhakadze, 2008
Implementation began in Tbilisi in 2008, at the School of Public Health of David Tvildiani Medical University. What started as an individual scholarly project grew into a long-term collaborative endeavour: students contributed under supervision, Georgian and international colleagues reviewed draft entries, legal experts cross-checked statutory definitions, and WHO and CDC sources were systematically consulted. The first electronic release — 1,352 terms, reference db190105/r200912 — was published at the ISI Glossary portal.
The work never stopped. Georgian public health evolved. New diseases emerged, new laws were passed, new international standards were adopted. Each change required the dictionary to follow. The database grew quietly, the Georgian entries became more precise, and the evidence base became more systematic. Today the database holds over 5,000 terms.
In 2026, the project reaches its concluding chapter. The Georgian Medical Journal — itself a product of the same sustained institutional effort — provides the permanent home. The first complete edition will be published with a DOI, an ISBN, and a printed book. The target date is 15 September 2026.
Recently published terms
476 terms published · Growing daily
The staircase model — one entry, every reader
Every entry is a staircase. A first-year student reads steps 1–4 and stops. A clinician reads to step 6. A researcher reads to the end. The same entry serves all without anyone wading through content they do not need.
Eight sources · One rule: every number carries source + year
The dictionary has always been a collaboration
From its first day this has been an open project. Georgian public health professionals, students, translators, researchers, legal experts and international colleagues have contributed since 2008. The database holds over 5,000 terms — 476 of which are published and verified. The remainder are in editorial review.
Contributions take five forms. All are reviewed by the editorial team before publication. Accepted contributors are credited in the dictionary entry and in the printed edition's acknowledgements.
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