On 7 April, the English-German Student Council of the University of Pécs Medical School organized the Motivational Speech for the sixth time in the School’s history. This year's speaker was Angel Giuffria who is a model, actress, and dedicated advocate of people with disabilities. The motivational speaker, born without her left forearm, talked about what it was like to wear a myoelectric prosthesis for the first time as a few-month-old baby, how she experienced challenges, and how she turned them into advantages.
At just 4 months and 10 days old, Angel Giuffria had already been wearing and controlling her first myoelectric limb (a prosthesis that can be controlled by the muscles of the residual limb). Her mother played a huge role in this, thanks to whom she was enrolled in a program in the frame of which prosthetic limbs were developed for young children.
Angel Giuffria has worn many prostheses so far, which have become more sophisticated as technology has improved. She is currently wearing one of the world's most advanced bionic forearms, which she presented in detail to the audience of the Dr. Romhányi György Aula, where she was also asked several fascinating questions.
Angel Giuffria emphasized that she has never considered herself disabled, as she has never felt that her birth defect hindered her in any way. Nothing illustrates it better than the fact that she has starred in several TV series (Chicago Med, FBI Most Wanted, Snowpiercer, and even in the movie Green Lantern), has appeared in advertising campaigns for Apple and Google, and is a world-renowned motivational speaker whose main message is to accept diversity with a positive attitude and to experience it as uniqueness and specialty, rather than a handicap.
Dávid Verébi took photos of the speech held in the Dr. György Romhányi Aula:
Photos:
Verébi Dávid/ÁOK